After selecting the candidates who were close to being able to hunt Poseidon, Xu Mingxi returned to the Star Luo Palace and attempted to merge the divine energies as soon as possible.
According to his observations, the power of faith acted like a kind of adhesive, mixing the origins contained in the divine fragments of the Star God with the origins of the Sun God and the Moon God, transforming them into a new divinity that only Xu Mingxi possessed.
Even with this power of faith, the fusion of the three divine origins was extremely slow and would take at least hundreds of years.
And the last time, the Sun and Moon Gods told him that the God of Asura had only lost the power of law enforcement for just over 300 years. If that time passed and Xu Mingxi had not yet become a god, no one could predict what might happen next.
The only solution Xu Mingxi could think of was to expand the pool of faith and use a massive amount of faith power to speed up the fusion of the three divine origins.
Currently, the Temple of the Star God had been built in almost all parts of the Star Luo Empire, with statues of the Star God carved to resemble Xu Mingxi. Every civilian who awakened their martial spirit for free would go there to worship.
As for the major soul master families and sects, they generally did not believe in gods. Even if there were statues of gods on the surface, without heartfelt offerings, no faith power would be produced.
What Xu Mingxi could do was control the massive vessel of the Star Luo Empire and allow the people and soul masters within the empire to live and work more peacefully.
In this way, they would be willing to have more children. With the rapid population growth, people would also worship the Star God more devoutly.
In addition, if he wanted to gain even more faith power, the only remaining option was to expand his territory.
After the fall of the Heaven Dou Empire, the Douluo Continent was roughly divided into six major powers—three on the human side and three on the soul beast side.
The Star Luo Empire, the Wuhun Empire, and the Sea God Island on the human side; and the Great Star Dou Forest, the Far North, and the Sea Soul Beasts on the beast side.
These six major powers divided the entire Douluo Continent. If Xu Mingxi wanted to expand externally, he had to choose an opponent and seize their territory.
He looked at the map of the power distribution on the Douluo Continent spread out on the table before him. His eyes gradually moved upward until they landed on the large words "Wuhun Empire."
Among the six powers, the Wuhun Empire's strength wasn't particularly impressive and was almost entirely supported by Qian Daoliu, Bibi Dong, and Jin Yu.
But their territory and population were the largest—even larger than the Star Luo Empire. Defeating them would be Xu Mingxi's greatest gain, allowing him to gain the trust of most of the continent.
Xu Mingxi sat on a futon in the retreat chamber, deep in thought. After sitting quietly for a long time, he suddenly realized he might have been thinking wrongly before.
Now the greatest threat to him and the Star Crown Sect was not Tang San—but Bibi Dong and Qian Renxue from the Spirit Hall.
Barring any unexpected events, those two would become gods before Tang San. At that point—unless the two women fell out and fought each other—no one on the continent could stop them. The power of gods was vastly different from ordinary soul masters, especially first-level gods like the Angel God and the Rakshasa God. As long as the two became familiar with their own powers, no one could defeat them.
Xu Mingxi knew that if he maintained the status quo, he wouldn't become a god faster than they would. He had to accelerate the process and gather more faith.
Or he could simply eliminate them and cut off the threat at the root. If he wanted to kill the two of them, Qian Daoliu was the first hurdle he had to overcome.
A killing intent flashed through Xu Mingxi's mind. As long as he could achieve his goals, he didn't mind using any means—even temporary betrayal.
Bo Saixi, Qian Daoliu, Bibi Dong—killing any one of these three would benefit him. If he could kill two of them, the Star Luo Empire would have no more rivals.
"If I show signs of fatigue, Qian Daoliu and the others definitely wouldn't hesitate to kill me. It all depends on who shows weakness first."
The candlelight in the retreat chamber went out, and Xu Mingxi resumed his training. He needed greater power to establish himself as the rightful ruler of the Star Luo Empire in one decisive move.
In a battle between four or even five unmatched fighters, no one dared say they would definitely win—especially in a situation where people's hearts were not united and everyone had their own hidden agendas.
No one knew in which direction the war would develop, and everyone believed they would achieve the final victory and reach the pinnacle.
The Star Luo Emperor did not need to appear before the people, and Xu Mingxi's retreat had no effect on the Star Luo Empire.
Except for Xu Mingjie's complaints, everyone else was quite satisfied. Without Xu Mingxi's oversight, they had opportunities to perform some minor maneuvers and strive for more benefits for their families and sects.
For example, some of the families behind the Spirit Battlefield discovered that even without the constraints of the Spirit Hall, their lives were not as comfortable as before.
The Star Luo Empire now had too much power. Whether they were originally developed here or fled from the Heaven Dou Empire, life was not easy.
Among the seven major families, the Suo and Li families had completely aligned themselves with the Qibao Glazed Sect and jointly controlled the area near Qibao Mountain. Their lives were relatively comfortable, but there were signs of assimilation. Relying on the fact that their patriarch was a Super Douluo, the Chen family had nearly swallowed the Mu family who had migrated with them and formed a separatist faction, continuing to grow and expand.
The Du family still carried out their intelligence business, with spies in the Heaven Dou Empire, and nothing much had changed.
Only the Zhao and Qian families, who had originally developed in the Star Luo Empire, suffered significant losses in this large-scale migration of power, with too many benefits taken by others.
The two titled Douluo of those families were not strong—both only at level 93—and no match at all for other forces, so they could only continue to endure.
"Old Zhao, if you ask me, we shouldn't have left the Spirit Hall in the first place. Now our two families are the ones suffering the most.
Look at them. Either they're strong enough, or they've found a backer. Our families are stuck here—how embarrassing."
"All right, Old Qian, stop talking. Did you forget we were against it from the start? The majority agreed, and we had no choice.
And don't forget, the higher-ups placed specific conditions on our two families. We even have that thing on our bodies. If we try to join another faction, we'll die."
"Sigh, so unlucky. Why did they choose our two families in the first place?"
"Because we were in the Star Luo Empire. Compared to the weakened Heaven Dou Empire, this place was much more threatening."
Zhao Gou and Qian Fu looked at each other, their eyes full of helplessness. If they had the choice, they wouldn't have left the Spirit Hall at all.