"I understand...Agiri didn't get his Mandate from the Imperial Seal. Or more accurately...before that, he already possessed a complete Mandate. Which means...that he can leave behind an Eternal Will. Most likely, the Will activates against anyone that puts the safety of Jiyan's soul at risk. Only you knew the truth. So as soon as you heard of our decision, you used my secret desire for Jiyan's body to trick me into messing with her soul—ready to use the Will's counterattack to...deal me a fatal blow. But the sword teleportation..." the supreme elder choked out the words. Intertwining between loud gasps of air and coughing fits.
Undeniably, he'd reached the end of his destiny. However, he still couldn't understand how Dilnaz and the Commandant coordinated this attack and refused to die ignorant. Though the supreme elder possessed the strongest cultivation base and highest practical authority in the clan, legally, until they selected a new clan master, Dilnaz was the Empyrean clan's leader. Knowing that the Divine Armament clan would only obey her, the supreme elder had all its key members monitored, and personally watched out for the Commandant. How did they evade his scrutiny?
Some of his coughed blood stained Dilnaz's face, giving her an air of heavenly demoness. With her smile unchanged, Dilnaz stood up and nodded in approval.
"Nicely resumed. Glad to see you still got half a brain. Indeed, just like the First Emperor, Agiri cultivated a complete Mandate before receiving the Imperial Seal: the Mandate of Suppression. I don't know the details of how he succeeded, but this makes him a True Dao Emperor—enabling him to leave behind an Eternal Will. Only one person knew this: I. Agiri kept that truth hidden from even his father, and never publicly used the power of his Mandate. In fact, he only revealed it to me because his death approached, and he needed me to have all the tools to protect his treasure: Jiyan.
It is very likely that his true strength surpassed the First Emperor's. If he didn't conceal his true abilities, how could Silav possibly injure him? As for the sword teleportation…" here Dilnaz paused and snapped her fingers. The Commandant, who still kneeled beside her, teleported to the supreme elder's left—right beside his cosmic pouch.
"After I became God-Empress, I created a rather useless ability: Self Chasing. Granted I have their permission, it enables me to teleport anyone to an item concealing the tiniest trace of my essence. The Heaven's Will Pill you accepted was refined from my Internal Heaven. Of course, it overflows with my essence. As soon as Agiri died, and I became the de facto master of the Divine Armament clan, I asked the Commandant of the Imperial Guard to give me his permission, and sent him away on a semi-trivial errand—waiting for your awakening.
We didn't have to communicate. I just needed to create one opportunity, and he could deal you a fatal blow. If you first chose to refine the pill, my essence would stain your body, and only make you die faster. Fortunately, you didn't. Otherwise, I'd truly have to give up on my Internal Heaven," Dilnaz sighed, and again snapped her fingers. The Commandant turned into a pitch-black longsword rippling with malevolent energies and flew into Dilnaz's hand.
But despite her revelations, the supreme elder couldn't digest the truth. "You're mad. Absolutely mad! What if I refused to accept the pill? You'd have traded 99% of your cultivation base for nothing!" The supreme elder roared, and wasn't exaggerating the facts. While Dilnaz only lost five levels, those five Monarch levels represented over 99% of her cultivation base. To bet such stakes on a yes or no decision was pure madness.
"Information is key to making the right choices. Just like I knew of Agiri's Mandate, I knew that the temptation of a pill made from a seven-colored Internal Heaven wasn't something you could resist. Why did you become a Dao Reserve? To evade your brother's era, bide your time, and wait for a chance to take the crown. For that, you need more than petty schemes. You need time and strength. My pill offered both, how could you resist it? But above that…" Dilnaz aligned her sword with the supreme elder's neck.
"When you choose to fight for the crown, you must be willing to gamble all you have at all times. I must be supreme. I must stand above all and rule this world. Should anything lie beyond, I must conquer it too. How dare you fetter my rise and threaten my daughter? You were just asking for it," Dilnaz declared and rammed her sword into the supreme elder's neck.
As he choked on his blood, the inconceivable occurred. At a lightning fast pace, the black sword drained the supreme elder's cultivation base, draining it to the last bit. The Commandant was initially a peak-level Empyrean Monarch. Wielding his sword form, Dilnaz could use his strength as she pleased, and challenge all under the Demi-Emperor-level. But now that he refined all the supreme elder's cultivation, the Golden Crow Ancestor and Silav aside, Dilnaz didn't fear anyone. More importantly, the sword could transfer its cultivation to Dilnaz, opening the road to endless possibilities.
Only the succeeding God-Emperors knew that the masters of the Divine Armament clan possessed that unique ability. Dilnaz only learned it after Agiri's death. Without its cultivation base to support it, the supreme elder's atrophied body couldn't survive its lethal blows, and the last spark of life vanished from his eyes. A look of pure terror remained on, and twisted his wrinkled face.
With his death, nothing stopped Dilnaz from taking his cosmic pouch and all it contained. Without hesitation, she swallowed her Heaven's Will pill, regaining 95% of her lost cultivation—then drained the fallen elder's strength from the sword. Dilnaz's cultivation thus rose straight to the Demi-Emperor-level, and she spun to face the 12 elders, who quivered to no end.
"W-we...we pledge loyalty to the new clan mast—no, to the new sovereign!" They said like a choir and kneeled before Dilnaz—as if they'd exchanged mental messages beforehand. Dilnaz's smile broadened, and she stepped toward them.
"Well said. However…" by the time the words reached their ears, her sword had beheaded them all, and drained their cultivation bases. Each new gain seemed to intensify the madness in her eyes.
"Unrivaled strength beats your shifting loyalty anytime of day. Don't worry, your fellow elders will join you in the afterlife." As she watched her elders' blood drench the ground, Dilnaz realized that all along, she never cared for the clan's wellbeing. It never mattered, and never would. Across the Empyrean clan's tens of thousands of kinsmen, the only one that mattered...stood at her back, and she spun to face her.
Though weakened by the supreme elder's attempt, Jiyan had already recovered her wits, and witnessed all that transpired. Dilnaz vanished, reappeared before Jiyan, and the two maintained eye contact.
"There has to be a drawback, I can already see it in your eyes. You're playing with fire and you know it. Is the appeal of supreme power—that—irresistible?" Jiyan asked in a sorrowful tone.
"Without power, how could your father protect you from a Demi-Emperor's grasp, even from the grave? Without power, how could I free myself of the elders' control? Without power, how could the Serpent Emperor devour the Primordial Dragon, and protect his beloved from his clutches? Power is everything, the melody that dictates the rhythm of our world. Unless you have neither desire nor thing to protect, you need power. And I live to make mine peerless. So yes, to me, it is irresistible," Dilnaz replied.
"Dad used to say that wealth is the slave of a wise man, and the master of a fool. I believe that applies to the current you," Jiyan countered, but, undisturbed, Dilnaz shrugged.
"I'm willing to be the fool, so long as my master is my blade," Dilnaz declared, reminding Jiyan that words couldn't halt her ambitions. Gluing her eyes on Dilnaz's forehead, Jiyan spotted the silver Sect Master Token hidden in her brain. Unlike Harun's Golden Token, silver tokens could be pulled out and shifted at will. But Dilnaz always kept hers embedded in her brain. Another show of resolve, perhaps.
Knowing the trouble it'd bring her, Jiyan never mentioned her ability to spot all tokens to anyone. And after this exchange, strengthened her resolve to keep the secret buried.
Dropping on her knees, Jiyan thrice kowtowed toward Dilnaz, and while keeping her forehead pressed on the ground, said.
"The first is to thank you for giving birth to me. The second for raising me. And the third for sheltering me—even if you did so in your own twisted way. Though we don't see eye to eye, and I will never approve of your path, I know that there is a place for me in your heart, and for that, I thank you. However, I do not want to see the day where your pursuit of supreme power conflicts with my existence. Farewell, mother."
Jiyan said, and as Dilnaz's expression twisted at the words, she stood up and left. Despite her incomparably higher cultivation and desire to stop Jiyan, something in Dilnaz prevented her from making a move—for deep down, she too feared that day.