The Rise of the Black Plain

Upon seeing the three people in front of him, Minos soon understood what was about to happen. He had made an offer to young Peter, and this man had probably convinced himself to follow the sovereign of the Black Plain.

After all, the possibility of him being chosen by one of the eight sects of the Flaming Empire was very low.

As for Maxwell, he, too, had not achieved a great ranking, so going to the empire with one of these sects was impossible for him. So, he could only return to the Snow Kingdom, where his family was.

The two young men already knew that Minos would not join any of these sects, so they were already prepared to come to him when it was time to leave.

Minos then smiled and said, "Oh? Did you come to say goodbye?"

"No. As you had previously proposed, I have decided to follow you back to your territories," Peter said firmly.

And soon after, Maxwell also gave his answer. "I will accompany you for a while, and then I will make my way back to the Snow Kingdom."

The Snow Kingdom was a long way from their current location. So, Maxwell and his guard had to 'skip' the Brown Kingdom, following another state that bordered the Cromwell Kingdom and the Flaming Empire.

And only after crossing that state would they finally reach the Snow Kingdom.

And while this kingdom is not located in the northern section of the Central Continent, as long as they maintained a low profile, the journey would not be troublesome if they traveled close to the northern boundary of the state...

"Hm, I see. But we're going back as fast as we can go. I just intend to stop to rest during this journey. Is it okay for you?"

"Yeah," the two responded, nodding their heads.

Of the two youths, Maxwell had a 4th stage spiritual beast, as was the case with Ruth's eagle. On the other hand, Peter didn't have any spiritual beast given that he had no family financing his expenses.

With that, Maxwell and his bodyguard followed on their beast, while Peter went along with Minos and Ruth on the back of the great white eagle, this would not hinder their journey since there was enough room for up to 3 people on the eagle's back.

After that, the group quickly started their journey to the Black Plain, leaving the capital of the Cromwell Kingdom behind.

...

Meanwhile, in Capital City, it had been a few hours since the end of the final battle of the Spiritual Tournament. Currently, the group of people who had been ranked were already lined up in the middle of a large hall that was inside the arena where the competition had taken place.

In the room, eight more people were sitting side by side in large armchairs while talking to each other, these were the envoys sent by the sects from the Flaming Empire.

Before these eight Spiritual Kings were the 25 youths who had managed to reach the fourth test of the competition. Among them were many of Minos' acquaintances, Abby, Mona, Troy, Davy, Kara, Ford, Roger, and a few other competitors ranked in the tournament.

As they waited for their names to be summoned, suddenly, someone asked in a low voice. "Hey! Where's that Minos? Did he forget the time to come here?"

"Hmm, that's right, we've been waiting here for 15 minutes already. I suspect that these experts are just waiting for him."

"What an arrogant guy, just a little bit of strength, and he already acts like this!"

Upon hearing this, Mona and Abby looked at each other with wry smiles on their faces. It seemed that Minos really didn't care about it, just as he had said to them.

As for Kara and her brother, they immediately responded when they heard this. "Minos told us that he had no interest in going to the empire."

After the young ginger said that with a pout, all the eight experts from the sects looked in the direction of the siblings in surprise before one of them inquired further, "Oh? Can you elaborate a bit more about that?"

Adjusting herself, Kara took a step ahead before saying politely, "Minos told us that he didn't want to join any sect. He was only here to improve his contacts and test his strength."

'What?' Troy questioned in his mind.

'And here I thought that this guy could become my rival... But he is just someone without any ambition!'

Troy was a little disappointed to hear this news. After all, this had been the first time he had met someone as talented as Minos. In fact, he even thought that if the two were to go to the sects in the Flaming Empire, they would undoubtedly have a great rivalry between them for a long time...

And that was something that Troy appreciated a lot. After all, rivals could inspire each other a lot, making one reach even greater heights than they could generally achieve if they didn't know each other!

But it was a pity that Minos didn't seem to think from a similar perspective...

Meanwhile, on hearing Kara's explanation, among the eight experts, it was only Sally who was not so shocked. After all, she already knew that Minos had refused the opportunity to go to the Gray Clouds Sect with his mother, Maisie Coleman.

She only had doubts about whether Minos would join a rival sect of the Gray Clouds Sect. But luckily, he seemed to not have any interest in any of them and not just the sect behind Sally...

'Good thing... It wouldn't look good if he went to a rival power!' she thought, letting out a sigh of relief.

At the same time, the seven Spiritual Kings were completely bewildered by this kind of decision. 'Who in their right mind would do that? Missing an opportunity that might never come back?' They tried to ponder, trying to understand why Minos would have thought this.

Going to an empire was not difficult. It was dangerous to venture to such a place without the help or support of great, powerful factions.

To put it into perspective, within the Flaming Empire, there were as many people with Black talent as there were people with Blue talent in the north of the Central Continent!

And not only that, while it was not uncommon to find natural regions with spiritual beasts of the 5th stage in the north of the Central Continent, in the Flaming Empire, though a similar condition could be seen, the only difference was rather than 5th stage beasts in the north of the Central Continent, the empire had an abundance of 6th stage spiritual beasts!

And this posed a severe problem. Even the strongest in the north of the Central Continent only at the 6th stage of cultivation... Therefore, if they traveled through the Flaming Empire, they would be constantly in danger!

Along with that, the number of people with Silver talent in the Flaming Empire was almost as high as the number of people with Black talent in the north of the Central Continent.

In fact, people with Silver talent were at the top position in the power pyramid, not just on the central continent but across all the human continents. After all, people with Golden talent were exceptionally rare.

Even having one with Golden talent among 100 million people would be considered incredible!

Thus, the Spiritual World was dominated by those people with Silver talent, while ruled from the shadows by those with Golden talent, who lived long enough to achieve high levels in their cultivation.

And because of this, going to venture into the empire alone where there were so many stronger and more talented people posed an absolute danger for someone who came from the impoverished north of the Central Continent.

And as a result, very few people dared to venture alone, leaving to seize the opportunity given by the sects of the Flaming Empire through the Spiritual Tournament. With this, if a single member of a family was successful in achieving this opportunity, one day they could be taken to these regions safely, as had happened with the Red family of the Brown Kingdom.

And it was due to these reasons that the seven Spiritual Kings present here could not understand Minos' decision. 'Does he have no bigger ambitions and just wants to live peacefully in this place?' This was the thought that lingered in their minds after not finding any other reasonable excuse.

Anyway, one of them finally decided to speak since these young people had been waiting for a while by now, "Well, since that's the case, let's get on with our business."

"First, the first three youths who have secured the top three positions will have the opportunity to choose any of the eight sects of the empire. Ehh, and even if Minos gave up, his position would not change..."

The blonde man then turned to Troy and Kara and said, "Make your choices!"

And it wasn't long before both of them gave their answers. Kara decided to go to Minos' mother's sect, the Gray Clouds Sect, while Troy chose the Holy Sect.

After the two had finished making their decisions, the other woman in the group spoke, "Now, we are going to call the names of some of you who were selected by the eight sects. When your name is called you must come forward to the person who calls your name. That will be your sect in the future..."

She then sighed while remembering Minos' case before saying, "Of course, you are free to refuse if you want to..."

And shortly after that, those selected began to be called.

"Davy Hayes."

"Mona Miller."

...

"Roger Aguilar."

"And lastly, Ford Carline."

After the names of 11 people were called out, each of them was allocated to different sect, with Mona ending up in the same sect as Kara, the Gray Clouds Sect.

The eight experts also called Luke's name, but he was long gone...

After that, each of these chosen competitors bid farewell to the groups that they had come with to the Cromwell Kingdom and then followed the eight young specialists from the Flaming Empire.

They were all brimming with excitement about the idea of going to such a strong place and couldn't wait to get to their new homes...

Unfortunately, Minos' beautiful friend, Abby, had not been summoned by any of the sects. And after saying her goodbyes to Mona, she and the bodyguards who accompanied them to the capital of the Cromwell Kingdom headed back to the Brown Kingdom, where the Miller family resided.

'Ahh! I'm happy for Mona, but now I've lost my best friend... Who knows how long it will take to see each other again...' Abby thought to herself while a bit of a saddened look appeared on her face.

'Who knows, perhaps I might end up visiting that disgusting brat, Minos, in the future...'

She grumbled to herself thinking about the words that the young Stuart had said to her after their match.