Chapter 3425: The Underlying Mechnism of Authority
Rui heaved a sigh as he compiled the scraps of information that he had gotten from the Whisperer. The fact that the Dragon Emperor needed radiation to survive was definitely the most powerful piece of intelligence that he had gotten from the woman. That was the most useful and what he could leverage the most effectively to fell the Dragon Emperor. In particular, he already had several pieces of ideas and methods that he could leverage to press on this weakness as hard as he could.
Of course, he intended to do a full deep-dive into the matter with the Forge of Creation empowered with the Prophecy of the Void, allowing him to objectively deduce what was the most effective technique to hard counter the Dragon Emperor.
Of course, with more data that he would gather in battle, he would be able to refine it even more and come up with truly antithetical techniques to crush the dragon.
Another useful tip was that the beasts of Kiriket had rather strict environmental limits, making it unlikely that they would be there to stand between Rui and the Dragon Emperor if he relied on a teleportation-related tactic. This made it easier for Rui to remove the Dragon Emperor from the proximity of the beasts and therianthropes of Kiriket.
The third scrap of information was why Rui wanted to remove him from proximity to the beasts and therianthropes of Kiriket, which was that the Dragon Emperor’s Authority of Alpha was not perfect. With distance and time, it would wane.
Rui wasn’t sure if he was subject to the same limitations, but his powerful instincts told him that he wasn’t. His Authority of Alpha was the same Authority of Alpha as the Eldritch Chimera at the very epicenter of the Beast Domain.
And the Eldritch Chimera’s Authority of Alpha had lasted seventeen years without diminishing in intensity by any means. Jormungandr’s Authority had gone eight months without any hints of diminishing.
Rui’s own Authority was active for nine months, and it hasn’t waned yet either.
Thus, if he used his own authority on the beasts and therianthropes of Kiriket and simultaneously displaced the Dragon Emperor away, he could break the beasts and monsters from their spell much more easily. These pieces of intelligence were certainly crucial and altered his plan, making his victory more probable.
However, they were as satisfactory as Rui was hoping.
Considering that he had altered the country’s political trajectory and even its fate, he felt he had been underchanged.
"What else?" he raised an eyebrow. "I’m sure you must have more."
The druid woman simply inhaled deeply as she huffed a ring of smoke into the air with a relaxed expression, even when Rui put mental pressure on her. In hindsight, he highly doubted that her decision to be high when he came over was random or a coincidence.
She was most likely to be less affected by his mental pressure and to hopefully resist his Authority of Alpha. Not that it would help her, but if it made her feel more comfortable, then it was understandable.
She heaved a deep breath. "The Dragon Emperor wants to eat you to empower his Authority of Alpha."
"I am aware of that," Rui heaved a sigh. "Not sure what that does for me, however."
"It also means that if you eat him, you can make your Authority of Alpha stronger as long as you figure out the underlying principles by which the Authority of Alpha functions," she informed him. "You can ascend higher in the hierarchy of life."
Rui’s eyes widened at those words.
He hadn’t even considered for a second that he could make his Authority even stronger than it already was. That was a stunning realization that made him ponder the possibilities of what could happen.
Was it possible to make his Authority even greater than it was right then?
He hadn’t even parsed the possibility before, but he highly doubted that it was maxed out by any means. But what he had in mind was a Beast Path progression trajectory, meaning that only therianthropes or hybrids with significant therianthropic blood could possibly grow stronger in this manner.
The notion of his Authority growing stronger was an attractive prospect, as far as Rui was concerned. Authority of Alpha was the ultimate antithetical adaptive evolution against beasts and monsters, as well as against the Beast Path; thus, it was a very powerful contributor to Project Water.
"The problem is that I have no idea how the Beast Path works when it comes to Authority of Alpha," Rui murmured. "No, it is more accurate to say that I have no idea how Authority of Alpha works."
What was Authority of Alpha?
If he was being entirely honest, he did not know. Hell, he had only learned that that was what it was called by the dark elves who told him.
He had copied it from the Eldritch Chimera when using Gigabrain to stop the Beast Incursion. Then, when he woke up fourteen months later inside the manifold, he used it to launch the Beast Excursion.
After that, he had been swarmed with event after event, each more important than the next, that he had never truly had the opportunity to simply sit down and study this ability that he had had.
Only ten months had passed since the Unfolding.
Though so much had happened that it felt like five years.
Now, he was forced to inspect the true nature of what the Authority of Alpha even was if he wanted it to grow stronger. Thankfully, while he hadn’t had time to properly dedicate all his attention to it, he had some intuitions, having used it multiple times until now.
Authority of Alpha was a highly advanced sociological phenomenon maxed out to its absolute maximum potential. All life in the world fit within a hierarchy. Some creatures were clearly superior to others. All species in the world were ranked in the hierarchy of life. However, that wasn’t all.
Within each species, all lifeforms could be ranked within a hierarchy as well.
This hierarchy usually conferred social power to those at the very top of the hierarchy, allowing them to exert command over their lesser kin.
Rui suspected that Authority of Alpha tapped into this phenomenon by convincing each lifeform subconsciously that the user was a part of their species, being able to trigger genetics that made them subservient to the user.
As long as the power gap was large enough, it could function effectively as slavery.