The First Elder was second only to the King in the highest ranks, and at times, not even the King’s word was as effective as his.
Thus, it was settled.
Everyone responded in unison, "Yes, Your Excellency the First Elder."
Amendo turned and left the hall, leaving the remaining details to be handled by those below him.
The opposition gloomily left the scene as well.
A large group of Elders swarmed up, smiling broadly as they shook Horus’s hand.
"Congratulations, Your Excellency Archbishop, a true leader has emerged from among us."
"Truly, a rising star."
"Though young, he is tactful and deeply understands the greater good. I believe the True Silver Vein will be better utilized in his hands."
"No, no, sending Elder Patrick, it’s Star Town — Star Town will develop faster, quickly becoming a prosperous human settlement."
"We’ve already thought of a name for his Battle Group, based on his Fire Spark — let’s call it the Black Battle Group."
"Speaking of which, how will Star Town be assigned?"
"It’ll be under the twelfth defense area. Isn’t Guardian Qingyu his fiancée?"
"Right, right, with his achievements, Lady Qingyu should give him the primary consort’s position, no matter how many royal spouses, he should be the one managing them."
In a stream of flatteries, Horus had the only useful suggestion.
"His Battle Group’s name, let it be Black Battle Group."
Rod soon received the official appointment from the Royal City.
Only now did he realize that the Defender was the highest position in a town.
The Mayor was merely a deputy handling normal affairs, and the governor was just a manager of the deputy.
Along with the official appointment, he also received a long letter from Horus.
In the letter, Horus wrote a lot, but the gist was to have him hold on to Star Town firmly, stabilize the situation, solidify his foothold, lay a strong foundation, and to avoid any rash actions that could jeopardize the hard-earned achievements.
He also warned him that the King could not provide assistance due to some reasons, and everything depended solely on him. The political climate within the Royal City was peculiar, urging him to be very cautious.
However, Rod wasn’t worried. The hardest first step had been taken. Next, he had plenty of ways to firmly bind the high-ranking officials of the Royal City with him.
When the interests of many aligned, all affairs could be more easily managed.
The current trouble was within the Dream Realm.
The entity known as the Ancient Sovereign was still invading the Dream Realm, and the Book of Knowledge anxiously roamed around the Obelisk every day, occasionally going to Star Square to check the trajectories of the stars.
Unfortunately, the pathways of the stars moved quite slowly. The last little stretch of the moment the stars gleam could be longer than anticipated.
Divinity could only be obtained from the Dream Realm during the gleaming of stars.
Rod once asked the Book of Knowledge what exactly Divinity was, and the book’s response was:
"The power of the Dream Realm."
This made Rod even more curious about what exactly the Dream Realm was.
It’s worth noting that the term "Dream Realm" was merely a substitute. Its original name was a string of incomprehensible text, which Rod directly translated as "Dream Realm."
The Book of Knowledge told him that the Dream Realm needed more Divinity to fend off such invasions, enhance suppression against the invaders, travel faster in the Spirit Realm, and possess stronger purification abilities.
Rod’s current achievements were sufficient to garner quite an amount of Divinity, but what made it anxious was that without the stars realigning, the Dream Realm could not harness this power.
This made Rod realize that there was a profound connection between the Dream Realm and the stars.
But the stars of this world, as he understood it, seemed not to be ordinary stars; they had some mystical force that could affect everything in the world in an incomprehensible manner.
The existence of the sun and moon was even more incredible—they completely defied the common sense known to Rod.
For instance, no time difference existed, no relative positions existed; from any direction, the position of the sun in the sky would never change. Night was always night, not implying it was daytime elsewhere,
baffling and incomprehensible.
Moreover, the sun and moon could influence not only the Material World but also the Spirit Realm.
In these two worlds, time was consistent, with not even a second of difference.
And the trouble for Rod now was, in order to leave the River of Eternal Death and Abyss of Darkness as quickly as possible and reach the City of Chaos, they had chosen an unsafe route. During the flight of the Dream Bubble, they had alarmed many unknown beings lying dormant deep within the Spirit Realm.
This phenomenon was particularly evident at night.
The Dream Realm could be pursued by many Spirit Realm monsters, and Rod had to stay in front of the Light Platform, manually operating the Dream Bubble to dodge their pursuit.
Only after night had passed could he take a moment to lie down in his rocking chair for a nap.
Initially, Rod had been relatively free, but with the arrival of the official appointment and a large number of miners, endless tasks overwhelmed him.
This thoroughly exhausted him, and the Book of Knowledge told him that it would take at least twenty days to reach the City of Chaos.
This meant that these twenty days were his period of danger.
Rod angrily blurted out the name of his second Fire Spark.