Liam smiled from ear to ear.
This journey had gone even better than expected.
Just in terms of quests, he accumulated nearly 1.5 million points and ranked first with over 650 000 points ahead of the second.
Since his last quest was special and required validation from the will of the world, it was still counted after Ilbert was discovered.
In addition, his personal strength developed during those years.
There were nearly 800 novarians, including 76 rank 2 novarian warriors and 372 rank 1 novarian apprentice warriors.
The Red-Moon Nagas now numbered 92. Although they were few, they were by far the strongest in the divine realm –Ilbert excluded of course.
There were 13 Naga apprentice warriors, 74 Naga warriors rank 2 and 5 rank 3 Great Naga warriors, including Sylvera at the pinnacle of rank 3, one intermediate-teir, and three beginners.
Regarding believers, the novarians represented 45 fanatics and 219 fervent believers, the Nagas 1 saint, 23 fanatics, and 37 fervent believers, and the Valyrs only had 26 true believers while the others were pan or false believers, except for Ilbert and Ruvia, who were both devout believers.
Since we are talking about that, lower existences all provided roughly the same amount of faith energy, but from rank 4 onwards, each rank would double the amount of energy produced.
Thus, Liam obtained nearly 3.6 million faith points per Earth day, and this would continue to increase.
Satisfied, he controlled his diadem and projected the hologram of his new race:
[Race: Valyr]
[Race category: humanoid]
[Race level: intermediate lower race *]
[Racial talents: None]
[Physique:
[Level 0: constitution: 0.9 || strength: 0.8 || Agility: 0.8 || Mind: 1.2 || life expectancy: 80 years]
[Level 1: constitution: 1.8 || strength: 1.7 || Agility: 1.7 || Mind: 2.9 || life expectancy: 110 years]
[Level 2: constitution: 4.2 || strength: 4.0 || Agility: 3.9 || Mind: 7.3 || life expectancy: 160 years]
(The norm for a normal and healthy adult human is one point everywhere)
(Max theoretical attribute: rank 0: 1.5 | rank 1: 4 | rank 2: 10 | rank 3: 40 | rank 4: 200)
He shrugged: it was to be expected.
The race level represented the maximum rank attainable through raw bloodline, in other words, the maximum level attainable by doing nothing but eating and sleeping.
One could say that even if they could reach rank 2 just by growing, they were very weak among lower races and could barely use their strong will to influence the real world.
On another scale, it was also the case for humans.
Let's take the example of Liam: even if his parents were demigods, he would never have reached rank 8 so quickly naturally, and it was only by practicing that he could advance at this speed.
However, the diadem was powerful enough to notice that there was still something special about the Valyrs.
Liam clicked on the * and a new panel appeared in front of him:
[This race is highly compatible with the path of the mage and, depending on the technique used and personal talent, they will be able to surpass their bloodline]
...
Liam spent the following hours patiently waiting for the timer to return to zero.
Ding
A shrill sound emitted from the watches of every student, and a holographic screen appeared in front of them.
[Congratulations to all students for completing the first mission in a foreign world]
[The official ranking is now available]
[1: Liam Adler - 1,526,000 points]
[2: Lena Williams - 918,000 points]
[3: Armand Nicher - 866,000 points]
...
As expected of a descendant of true gods, Lena was very excellent, both in terms of believers and personal strength.
Liam was certain that his own believers – Ilbert still excluded – would not be able to stand up to her.
As for the third, his name didn't ring a bell, so he was probably a student from elite class #2.
With his score, it was very likely that he would soon move up to elite class #1.
As Liam scanned the board and looked for his classmates' positions, he received a new message from his head teacher.
[All students are requested to return to the arrival point as soon as possible]
Liam wasted no time and stored his divine realm in his spatial ring. The list wasn't going anywhere, and he would look at it later.
...
A few minutes later, Liam found some of his classmates and they began an animated discussion about their adventures of the past ten years.
"I was very lucky since the beginning and I arrived next to a goblin camp. Even though they weren't very smart or numerous, I managed to make them my believers by giving them food. I think they'll be able to become an intelligent race in a hundred years,"
Miranda said with a smile.
"As I completed quests, I found other goblin tribes. In the end, I have over 5,000 believers now."
Goblins were one of the genetically poorest races in the universe.
The only advantage was that almost all worlds make them evolve after a certain time, but the disadvantages were quite obvious: it was very rare for them to rise up and become superior races.
There were of course exceptions, and Liam heard about several worlds entirely dominated by goblins, but it wasn't that surprising.
As long as they had time and someone to guide them, even pigs could become a divine race.
It was basically the same for all lower races.
He also knew there were some novarian tribes in the plane, but he didn't want to waste his precious time for harvesting a few thousand weaklings
Moreover, he had a certain project for the novarians, but he needed their race to remain as pure as possible to carry it out, even if it should still wait a while: he probably had to become a demigod to do what he was thinking.
There were already two different novarian tribes in his divine realm (the original one and the pearl one), and adding more would only make his future project more difficult.
Mario for his part also exclaimed.
"Well, even if I wasn't as lucky as you, I still found some kind of four-legged beast with good defense and a pair of wings. I managed to catch nearly a hundred of them, and I plan to let my kobolds train them to form a flying cavalry."
Liam congratulated his friend, and they continued to discuss until Mr. Idder showed up and calmed the crowd.
"Congratulations for completing your first planar expedition, which for most of you was a brilliant success. In any case, this experience will be very valuable to you in the future."
Most of them, including Liam, smiled slightly at their teacher's compliments.
"However!"
"Even for those who achieved excellent rankings, you cannot relax and must continue to do your best. You are in elite class, which means you don't want to become a support god, but rather a true sovereign."
"As some of your comrades have realized to their own detriment, a single event can change everything!" he said, staring at some students who immediately lowered their gaze by shame.
"You must do everything possible, so when such unforeseen events occur, because they will inevitably occur sooner or later, you will be strong enough to face them without problems."
The jovial air of the students had disappeared, replaced by serious faces as they became aware of the cruel reality of the path they had chosen.
"Well, I didn't come here to dampen the mood either, so let's move on to the rewards."
The man brought up the ranking behind him and continued.
"I assume most of you have rushed to grab everything you could find, and your divine realm is not far from overload. So the first reward will be a fragment of origin stone from a lower plane. The top five will get the equivalent of 10% of an origin stone, the top 10, 8%, the top 20, 5%, and the others 2%."
Liam smiled from ear to ear.
Mr. Idder was quite right, and his demi-plane was more than overloaded.
Between animals, plants, earth, magical objects, precious ores and plants, Valyrs, and Ilbert, an intermediate existence, he estimated that he couldn't add anything else before December if he didn't do anything special.
And that was taking into account the incoming upgrade of his divine realm thanks to the nearly 4500 spirit stones he had outside the spiritual garden, otherwise it would stretch until March.
"Shut up or no one will get anything!"
Said Mr. Idder as the students began to stir, immediately bringing calm back to the spatial void.
"The second reward will be spirit stones: you will all get 250, the top hundred will get 250 more, the top fifty 250 more, the top twenty 250 more, the top ten 500 more, the top five 500 more, the third 250 more, the second 500 more, and the first 1000 more."
"3000!" Liam exclaimed inwardly.
That was more than half of what he obtained in the plane by looting the spirit stone vein and the Valyrs' treasure trove.
Spirit stones were not cheap at all; just one of them was worth as much as a red pearl (100,000 faith points).
In other words, he just won the equivalent of 3 blue pearls.
"Finally, we will open an exchange shop so you can spend your points. If you don't find anything to your liking, you can save your points. Other exams will be organized later and you can accumulate points to buy something better."
At that time, space warped a few thousand kilometers away.
Finally, a huge space battleship emerged from the interstices of the void.
Liam wasn't sure if it was the same that dropped them off, but one thing was certain: it was the same model.
As the starlight illuminated the enormous spaceship, the smiles of the students gradually turned into expressions of horror.
There were several huge impacts on the ship, and two of the main cannons were completely destroyed.
The armored hull was torn in several places, and several engines seemed to be malfunctioning: the ship seemed almost ready for scrap.
"What kind of force could cause this kind of damage?!"
That was the question everyone here was asking inwardly.
These ships were specially made for wars against rank 4 and 5 worlds.
There was a high god at the controls, and even true gods would face great difficulty getting through the energy shield of the battleships.
Liam felt panic assail his mind as he realized how insignificant and powerless he was in the face of the ongoing war.
Even though he didn't know why, he felt a deep urgency rising in his heart: he had to become stronger, and quickly.
Full of apprehension on the future, they headed towards one of the still functioning bays.
The few remaining jump engines ignited, and the several hundred kilometers long ship vanished, bringing calm back to the solar system.
End of Volume I: The Fallen Princess