Despite her fear, she said, "If you want my position in the army, I can’t give it to you. Only the sect can assign someone to this position, and the sect has an internal system for deciding who will become the commander. Even if you kill me, you won’t get my grade 5 mission."
In response, Loki said nonchalantly, "I know."
He didn’t know, actually. But he had already activated the Thought Reading Metac, which he is using to hear her thoughts.
So he knew what she was thinking and knew that she was speaking the truth, which is why he was confident in putting on airs of someone who had everything under his control.
Then he said, "Not to worry. I am not after your position. I am here for two things, which you can help me with without any detriments to yourself."
"Of course, if you are hell-bent on being stubborn, this pleasant conversation of ours can quickly turn into an unpleasant one full of violence and pain. The choice is yours."
His words were things that she didn’t expect to ever hear from another rank 4 being. But as humiliating as it was to be threatened by a fellow rank 4 cultivator, she had to grit her teeth and say, "What do you want from me?"
Loki replied, saying, "The first thing that I want is how to advance to rank 5. I want every single step with nothing missing."
Before she could say anything, he shook his head and said, "Don’t deny it. Don’t say that you don’t know, because I know for a fact that you know. I have done my research, so I know that you know how to advance to rank 5."
"And don’t try to lie to me either. I came prepared, so I will be able to tell if you’re lying. You are not the first person I will be asking about this, and you won’t be the last, so I will be able to spot any inconsistencies immediately I see them."
Then he proceeded to look directly into her eyes as he said, "Remember that the choice is yours. This can be a pleasant conversation, or it can become a conversation that you will regret having."
After saying so much, he became silent and waited for her response. He only had to wait a few seconds because Amelia needed time to get her thoughts together and decide exactly what to say.
When she was done making up her mind, she said, "There are five steps to advancing to rank 5. The first one is reaching the peak of rank 4."
She gave him a look over before she said, "With your power, you should have already accomplished this. And if you haven’t, it shouldn’t be a problem for you."
Then she said, "The second requirement is a rank 5 Dao Heart. This is very important and can not be omitted. Lacking Dao Heart can lead to death, but the most common consequence of the lack of a sufficiently powerful Dao Heart is madness."
"The third requirement is the skill of energy manipulation. You have to reach 400% overload capacity. If you don’t meet this requirement, your energy well will explode during advancement, and you will surely die."
She took a pause now and contemplated lying for the next two requirements.
The first three requirements are pretty common knowledge that anyone can guess based on the previous requirements for advancements. The really important part is what she is about to say next.
This next part is the part that people keep secret, or at least sell for a lot of money, so she doesn’t want to tell Loki for free. Her resistance to divulge such important information for free made her tempted to lie.
After deciding on what to do, she said, "The next step is finding a natural wonder and fusing with it. This step is very important because it has to be carried out after the first three steps and before the last step."
She took a breath as she said, "The first three requirements can be met in any order. Their order isn’t important. But the next step has to be taken seriously and carried out in a particular order."
"So you can only fuse with the natural wonder after you have reached the peak of rank 4, achieved rank 5 Dao Heart, and accomplished a 400% overload capacity. Only after doing this can you move on to the last step, which is refining a rank 5 Core Metac."
She stopped talking after saying this. Loki was listening to her thoughts, so he heard her say to herself, "I hope you choke and die."
But he acted as if he didn’t hear her wish for him and said, "What is a natural wonder and how can I get it?"
She groaned inwardly before saying, "A natural wonder is a special object of great power that appears in the Blessed Heaven World when it collides with other worlds. The only way to get it is through luck when you stumble onto it or from divine beings."
Loki’s eye twitched when he heard that last option. He even said to himself, "You want me to ask the people who banned the creation of more rank 5 cultivators for help advancing to rank 5? How will I manage that?"
But outwardly, he glared at her and said, "Are you sure that those are the only two options? Are you very sure?"
His question made her hesitate for a bit. Then she said, "You can also get natural wonders from destroyed small worlds and the cave heaven of divine beings."
Her reply made Loki chuckle and say to himself, "It seems she is determined not to tell me about invading worlds and getting the natural wonders from the heart of the world. But no matter. I already know from her thoughts."
He didn’t expose her for hiding that secret, but instead said to her, "Are you saying that if we destroy this small world, we can get natural wonders from it?"