On the way to the Arantara Alliance's base on Arantara Gaia, Acheron successfuly got acquainted with the other young lady. Her name was Karin, and she came from the Torus Empire, a human force a few nations away from the Human Coalition, on the outskirts of the Mona Galaxy.
Apparently, the Torus Empire, a newly risen nation that has just entered its space age, has become a subordinate force of the Arantara Alliance, successfully elevating their status in the Mona Galaxy. As the only one of the princesses with good cultivation talent, she was being sent to the alliance for diplomatic reasons.
What was special about her was that she, similar to her father, the emperor, has managed to awaken the venerable Conqueror bloodline, as she calls it. For now, the only ability she gained from her bloodline was unleashing some sort of formless pressure that incapacitated weaker enemies. Her father on the other hand, had a few more other abilities that she wasn't willing to talk about.
Acheron found it interesting that she was willing to talk about what was supposed to be classified information, even if only a little. This could bring danger to her and her empire if not managed properly.
This belief was reaffirmed when they happened to shake hands. He realized what his future goal was immediately. He was the danger.
"Bloodline Detected: Conqueror's Domination"
"Would you like to begin the extraction procedure?"
Naturally, Acheron couldn't do anything for now. But what about the future? He felt this bloodline was very important to him, after all. Thinking about this, he smiled, content with his discovery.
Since Karin was joining the Arantara Alliance, he decided on a better target, the emperor of the Torus Empire. Deciding on a target, he naturally asked the most important question.
"What is the cultivation of your father?"
Karin chuckled with a bitter smile, "He is merely at the beginning of the Heavenly Tribulation realm, still too weak to fend for himself in the vast universe."
Clearly she wasn't that happy about her nation becoming a vassal of the Arantara Alliance.
Regardless, now that Acheron found out about bloodlines, he was determined to research them extensively. His blood magic could prove very useful when fighting bloodline holders, as long as he did it right.
He already had an idea for a very useful spell. It would have to wait until he studied bloodlines in-depth though.
What he was currently most interested in studying were formations and artifact forging. He wanted to create a giant sword for himself. He couldn't keep fighting with his bare hands. Especially now that he's entering a bigger stage.
After some more chatting with Karin, he returned to his room.
A month later, they've successfuly reached Arantara Gaia. The spaceport of this planet was brimming with activity. As expected of the alliance's base.
"Your spaceship will be given to you after you join one of the sects. Each sect has to provide their disciples with a spaceship. This is part of the rules, so don't worry about it. Also, remember this. Even though you were geniuses in your forces, here you are ordinary." said Haren
After covering them in his energy, Haren directly took them to a large dark blue palace-like hall. This is where many other envoys and their geniuses gathered.
A few calculations later, Acheron realized that there weren't more than a few hundreds of people gathered. This clearly showed how many weaker forces were forced to send their geniuses here. If every envoy brought at least three seedlings, then there were at least a hundred envoys present here.
It is also worth mentioning that to be an envoy, one had to be in the Planetary Subduing stage of strength.
There being so many Planetary Subduing stage cultivators and so little Galactic Travel ones left Acheron feeling a bit strange. Was it that difficult to advance? Given the scale of the alliance, there were at least a few thousands of Planetary Subduing cultivators.
Yet, it was obvious that not even one in a thousand of these cultivators could obtain the opportunity to enter the next stage of strength.
Finally, a man dressed in dark blue warrior robes appeared on the distant podium. Waving his hand, hundreds of bracelets flew towards the young men and women.
"These are your communication devices of our Arantara Alliance. They are made of a special alloy that can't be destroyed in battle. You can wear them without any worry. They also have integrated trackers. If you like your privacy, you can simply place it in your storage ring when not in use. These devices are all connected to our interstellar network. Feel free to research the sects you would like to join by yourself. The elders that were sent by the sects won't bother explaining every little detail to you."
Once Acheron got his hands on the bracelet, he immediately pressed the only button on it, opening up a hologram. After searching for a bit, he got an idea about the strength of the five behemoths.
The information on the network didn't betray his expectations. The Banyan Sect had the most Divine Absolution realm cultivators, despite not being that popular. While the others had twenty to forty percent less than the Banyan Sect, with the Astral Divination Sect being the weakest overall.
Merely seeing these numbers, Acheron reached a conclusion. He would join Banyan Sect. The only problem was that he would have to take an entrance test once he reached the home planet of the sect.
Elders of various sects stepped up on the podium and introduced themselves. All the young men and women had to do was walk up to them and state their name and where they came from.
Both Anna and Karin decisively joined the Cherry Blossom Sect's elder. Although Heavenly Sword Sect seemed more appealing to Anna, she thought she would face less problems if she joined an only-women sect.
The elder of the Banyan Sect looked like a young woman with bluish white hair. Her eyes were the same bluish white, filled with coldness. She asked to be called Elder Fei. Of the hundreds of seedlings, only a dozen decided to join Banyan. This was most likely because of the difficult entrance test and lack of information regarding it.
After Elder Fei made sure all of those who wanted to join Banyan were gathered around her, she motioned them to follow her. Finally, they returned to the spaceport.
The candidates were facing a dark blue triangular spaceship. It could easily hold more than a hundred people.
"Follow me." said Elder Fei.
As all ten of them were gathered in the control room of the spaceship, Elder Fei started briefing them on the details of their test.
"Once we reach the main planet of our territory, Kor'Ton, you will be required to take a test. I will send you to one of the most perilous mountain ranges, where all you will have to do is survive for a month. Throughout this month, you must travel a long distance until you reach the premises of our sect. The location will be shown on the map sent to your bracelet.
Also, you are not allowed to form teams and must travel alone. Failure to get there in the allocated time means you failed and must become a servant of the sect." explained Elder Fei.