Behan appeared with Solanky at the border of a distant star system that spanned a million light-years across its diameter. This star system was a world Behan had renovated himself, built to nurture beings he had rescued during his adventures in and outside the beyond realm. Although it wasn't a personal realm linked to him, he still controlled everything within it as if he were its creator, and he could even trap careless ancestor beings beneath the fifth-turn who recklessly barged in.
Wrapping Solanky in his spiritual power, he took a single step and appeared at the center of the star system, where six stars burning with different colors orbited a continent. The continent was only a few thousand kilometers in circumference, with a hundred-kilometer black pillar erected at its center. Solanky instinctively activated his observational technique, and what he discovered shocked him greatly.
The six colored stars were all part of a larger formation, with the continent serving as its core — the eye of the formation. The moment they appeared within it, his spiritual essence was suppressed and he couldn't even circulate his world energies. But the most shocking thing was the disconnection from his original body in the forsaken realm — he couldn't even share information with his main body to determine his exact location relative to the forsaken realm.
Behan smiled. "This world's formation is a technique Bragon shared with me. It's similar to the true peak-turn ability of a world's sovereign ability — cutting you off from the outside world so completely that even clones can't contact each other, regardless of sharing the same consciousness. Don't worry; even ancestor-level beings would find it difficult to escape this world, and I can completely destroy that body within it. But you can only learn this technique once your spiritual essence and power reach the third-turn."
Hearing this, Solanky grew alarmed. From what Behan had said, he now understood a little of the world sovereign ability the serpentine woman had cursed she couldn't use during their previous clash in the elite competition. That meant in a real battle, she could trap him in one of her worlds, and he wouldn't be able to escape without self-destructing the physical body of his black god clone. The thought terrified him — he now understood that his spiritual body alone, even at the true peak-turns level, wasn't enough to battle a genuine true peak-turn being wielding power unrestricted and unrestrained.
Behan brought black god Solanky with him onto the continent. The space around them rippled, and three silhouettes appeared — the clones of Govot and Jenny, together with the main body of the forsaken god. The instant they materialized, they teleported to the spot where Behan and black god Solanky stood.
Govot looked at black god Solanky and nodded approvingly, stretching out an arm. The moment he did, the golden bracelet on black god Solanky's wrist detached itself and flew toward him. As the bracelet settled into his hand, the space behind Govot's clone distorted, and a tall, well-built man in golden robes, wearing a crown of nine stars, stepped out of the rift. This man was none other than the true body of Govot himself. From what Solanky had learned about the guardians, Govot was said to possess the most clones of any of them — the number was undisclosed, but rumor held that he had at least eight, the weakest of which stood at the third-turn.
The true body of Govot raised a hand, and the entire star field was sealed off from the outside world, a second layer of protection. He tapped the golden bracelet, and a spiritual projection of Bragon appeared.
When Bragon's projection saw Govot's true body, he smiled. "Old friend, I cannot accompany you into the draft world, but there is something important you need to know." His gaze shifted to black god Solanky. "This junior is my last chance at reconstructing my scattered spiritual essence. From my analysis, once he reaches the true peak-turns level, the power of his lifeform awakening will let him skip the first-turn entirely and step directly into the second-turn. But he must not attempt a breakthrough before his spiritual power reaches the third-turn."
Govot and the other guardians' clones were amazed — they all understood how rare it was for a being to skip an entire cultivation realm. If Solanky achieved that, no second- or third-turn being would be his match, and even fourth-turn beings would struggle to eliminate him.
Bragon continued. "He has inherited the nine lightning tribulations thunder that the malevolent spirits and the gluttonous god covet. During my fight with them, before my body was slain, the Levian Progenitor and the others summoned a mysterious eighth-turn being from another beyond realm to help them capture me — to help them repair a broken treasure I believe an Above Peak-turn being left behind to invade this realm and steal the eternal soil. Among the countless beings of the malevolent side imprisoned within my world treasure, I discovered that the Levian Progenitor had found a scroll somewhere in the draft world — one with a seventy percent chance of using the eternal soil to elevate their power to the Above Peak-turn level. From that being's memory, I learned they had already gathered every ingredient except three, of which the eternal soil was one; the other two remain unknown to him.
"This is the best time to strike and eliminate the levians from the beyond realm, but the laws that mysterious power has set in place prevent us from acting now. Still, I've found a loophole. It will only mean eliminating a clone, but it will let us act the next time he attempts to enter again. And the most important thing I discovered — the thing that ultimately led to my death, beyond the scroll itself — is that in a hundred thousand samsaras (100 quintillion) years from the time I was killed, an altar will emerge in a desolate, distant region of the draft world. There, true peak-turns beings will have the chance to rise above the peak-turns, and they will find countless laws and treasures left behind by powerful ancient existences from before the beyond realms and worlds were even formed."
Bragon's projection dissipated. Govot stood for a moment in a dazed silence, then nodded to the forsaken god and vanished — he had to meet with the main bodies of Behan and Jenny to prepare their next move and contingency plans. The clone nodded to the forsaken god, instructing him to retrieve Solanky's main body from outside his realm so it could be brought to black god Solanky's current location. The forsaken god used his connection to his god-realm and drew Solanky outside.
The instant his true body appeared beyond the forsaken realm, a giant hand charged with power seized him. He had no way to resist and could only stand still as he was carried off. Moments later, the space above black god Solanky's clone distorted, and a hand descended, dropping his true body into place. It was Behan's clone's hand — one that had somehow traversed the vast expanse of space between the two locations and returned with his main body.
Solanky looked on, stunned, and asked how far it truly was from the forsaken realm to the border of the continent.
Behan answered simply: only a few hundred billion light-years.
Solanky was astonished — he couldn't comprehend how that distance had been crossed. And the more he learned, the more he understood just how terrifying it was to face a guardian-level being. He could be annihilated in an instant, without even knowing who had killed him.