"Elephant Boy?! ELEPHANT BOY?! How dare you?! A lowly being like you dares refer to me as 'Elephant boy?!"
"And who are you to make such demands of me?!" He was confused and angry with his current situation already and now some weakling had come over and started shouting commands.
Because of the nature of Ray's power, as in being mostly physical with all of his mana being under his control at all times, unless he went out of his way to show himself, he would always appear no different from a normal human.
Someone with a mana core would always release a little mana from their bodies unless they went out of their way to conceal it. The density and purity could be used to determine their strength.
It would be reasonable to assume that one born with a mana pool would have more control over this, but it was the opposite. Those with a mana pool would have even more trouble and a bigger aura than those without, making them easily identifiable.
But the heart of mana, and eventually one with mana, was different. All of his mana was under his control at all times, even more so than his physical body, so naturally it wouldn't be leaking everywhere unless he wanted it to.
So in the eyes of the golden flame war elephant, he was even weaker than he was after transformation.
This was also due to the fact that Ray wasn't using his authority to rule over him, at that time he would have no choice but to kneel and wait for commands no matter how much he resisted.
From this perspective he was indeed a little better than a slave as he would only feel the oppression whenever Ray wanted him to, not that he knew of than now.
"I am me of course." Ray was messing around with him a little. He wasn't in any danger and the elephant would end its own life without hesitation if he willed it to. Naturally he wasn't afraid of his little temper tantrums.
"Arrogance! You think that a worm like you can contest me just because I am a little weak?! Let me show you how wrong you are!!!" All around his body, brownish gold flames busted out.
As his entire physique was purified due to his connection with Ray, or to be specific his talent, the inconsistencies in his flame which was the separation between the black core and gold flames was illiminated. This led to the two parts being fused perfectly, increasing its power and changing its appearance.
Naturally he felt this difference and was excited.
"HAHAHA If I knew that transformation would lead to such an improvement I would have done it ages ago!!!" He lunged at Ray and sent two balls of his new fire at him, while also sprinting at him with another two ready to go.
He was surprisingly agile and coordinated, but this was to be expected. While his body was 'new' in a sense, in reality it was very much his own body. He only had to get accustomed to it, and after running for his life for a few hours he was very much so.
Amused, Ray dodged the first two and flipped over his head to avoid the other two. Not even at the peak of his power could elephant boy really challenge him so he was feeling no pressure now.
No matter what was thrown at him, Ray was elegantly avoiding it and was carefully observing the mana activity. Earlier he saw the pseudo-swamp tyrant canceling out magic attacks by countering the flow and now that he had a perfect specimen he was trying to attempt the same.
As a magic casting beast such an action came naturally to the big snake, but he was confident that he could replicate it. When it came to all things mana he was a genius so after a few more fireballs he got the basics down.
When the next fireball was shot a colorless wave of mana radiated out from him which had roughly the opposite flow. The two collided, but instead of canceling it out entirely it was severely weakened.
'Huh, I guess I can't expect to get it on the first try.'
For a few more minutes he tried it again and again and the elephant boy was none the wiser. This couldn't be helped, most people were not like Ray being so sensitive to mana, especially his own, and wouldn't notice any difference.
Plus none of his fire balls actually hit anything so he couldn't compare the impacts to see that something was wrong. But even if he could, he wasn't in the mental state to do so.
"IS THAT ALL YOU HAVE?! BIG TALK AND FAST FEET?! TRASH LIKE YOU SHOULD GO AND DIE IN A HOLE SOMEWHERE AND NOT BLOCK MY WAY." This charade had been going for almost half an hour and he was getting anxious.
All this noise and mana waves would no doubt attract some beast and they would take any chance to deal with him. One might point out the fact that Ray killed a grandmaster ranked beast in one shot but he was too angry to remember that, and even if he wasn't he would simply chuck it up to him catching it off guard.
No matter how he looked at Ray he was the weakest of the weak and his dodging capabilities confused him, but not enough for him to stop and think properly.
Hearing the equivalent of his slave shout at him and call him trash, even calling for his death, Ray got a little ticked off. But he wasn't going to use his status over him, instead he was going to shut him up using his own strength.
Being suppressed for the majority of his life, it wasn't something that he wanted to put onto others. Seeing people in that situation brought back some bad memories so he naturally wasn't going to do it to his own people.
While he may not particularly like the elephant boy, he still was his people so he wasn't going to treat him like that. Otherwise if it was any other man in his position they would have long commanded Laura to warm their bed, that's not a beauty one could just ignore when they are the ones in control.
While they were on similar levels in a sense, if he really wanted to he could still force her hand. Just not as easily as elephant boy.
His irises went from black to amber and his pupils became slits. His were the eyes of a predator and a feeling of doom washed over elephant boy. Under the effects of beast pressure he had no choice but to stop his attack and stand there in horror.
Not because he was such a coward that he was too scared to move, but because he couldn't. A combination of his own strength and purity of bloodline made it so that unless one was on the same tier or higher as he was or had a stronger bloodline they would have no choice but to stay there and wait for his command.
Being as strong as him was easy enough, but having a stronger bloodline was next to impossible. All nine of the ancient behemoth's children were equal in their bloodline with the behemoth having a slight advantage because of its similarities to its mother.
Normally this would be negligent, the difference between 1 and 1.001, but with beast pressure even one with a 100% pure bloodline of the other 8 would still be affected even if just a little bit by his beast pressure.
Unless they were lucky enough to be born with more than one, or were also attempting to do what he was, as in recreating the ancient behemoth physique, then all under him would have no choice but to submit.
Their muscles would physically lock in place so they couldn't move, and they would be so distraught mentally that they wouldn't be able to use any spell, curses or cultivation techniques.
This was the trade off for the pitiful lack of abilities that the behemoth physique gave him. The other 8 would have some sort of special trademark ability and other less powerful but still useful side abilities, like the dragon's might and roar, or the phoenix's regenerative power and rebirth ability, or the cloning and reabsorption of the swarm queen.
But the beast pressure was such a useful ability that that's all that he got out of a 100% purity bloodline even under the effects of his talent. The ability from the behemoth body didn't count because all of its functionality was preserved by beast pressure and beast pressure could be used in an aoe fashion.
And elephant boy was feeling it hard now. In just a few seconds he was foaming at the mouth fully past out, but still standing straight. Even when not conscious his body wasn't even allowed to rest in Ray's presence.