To Zhangyu, the focus was clear: conquer the waterway, heaven, starry sky and netherworld of the western region.
"Zhang Ling is taking control of the waterway, constantly guiding the waters, taking over authority, assigning clan members… this shouldn't take too long.
Fortunately I wasn't stupid and established an Octopus clan, but called it the Sea Beast Clan. This way, every sea beast may enter my clan."
He had a smug face when he thought of this. The largest mistake of dragons, in his opinion, was that they wanted all water animals to become dragons.
The phoenix were softer – they enhanced the foundation of all aerial animals by giving them their bloodline. Whether you want to become a phoenix or simply use the bloodline to enhance your own, everything was fine. Though this did restrict any other aerial animals, making it impossible for someone else to take over the royal family of the aerial animals.
As for the qilin, they were noble and didn't care. As protectors, they didn't have a deep wish to conquer people. Every land animal could join the qilin clan as long as they protected their territory.
"Maybe it's because of this that the qilin are so popular… then again, their lack of prestige and control set them back, even though they should've had the advantage with so many powerful vassals."
Zhangyu stopped thinking about it.
His sea beast clan was called "Beast" because every animal was a beast. At this point in time, things were separated simply: Innate Sacred and Beasts.
"Though the dog on Sumeru is trying to establish the Demons as a separate race…"
He smiled, then really stopped thinking about it.
"Let's go now. The waterway is being conquered slowly, but the other things are difficult to accomplish in a short time.
I should first create an internal conflict between the land beast clan and the ferocious beast clan. This way, Hongjun and Louhou, who are both involved in this, should be distracted.
Once they are too busy with things, it should be easy for me to do a few things in the west."
Walking out of the hall he was just in, he saw the prosperity around.
When constructing the sea beast clan, he of course used his own domain, the heart core of the west, a sub-realm, as the ancestral home of the clan.
Because of this, numerous west sea beast clans joined in.
They could enjoy such an environment, together with the protection of the clan leader, simply by joining this alliance.
Yes, to them, this was more of an alliance than a real clan.
If you listen to the rumours of the dragon clan in the east, you'll know that they either made you change to the dragon path, or you became a vassal, a servant.
Meanwhile, you didn't have any deep obligations, and everyone was on the same level.
Even the octopus clan only had a more prominent, as the clan leader and his right-hand man were octopi, but the left-hand man was a jellyfish, a whole different family tree from the octopi.
This created an equal and harmonious environment.
Even the buildings reflected this: although Zhangyu opted for a hall-like building architecture, where everyone build large halls and adjacent rooms, they still managed to make it unique.
Some halls were built from reefs, others were basically just pillars, some were even less, only a platform.
These were rather rare, most were many halls attached together and marked with their own symbols, just changing the colour slightly.
When Zhangyu looked at the countless halls on the ground and floating in the water, he was very proud.
"This is what an ancestral home should look like! Lively and full of people moving around! Not like those imposing imperial palaces that restricted everyone, giving a sense of being in prison rather than your ancestral land!"
He didn't waste any chance to criticize the dragon clan.
As he swam in the clan land, he saw many greet him, all in their unique forms.
Because the west sea was deep, it had a vast variety of lifeform.
Those that live in the high shallow waters close to the shore, and those that live in the deepest depths.
The ancestral land was able to locally simulate the creature's home, even having the option of transferring the ancestral land of every sub-clan into the ancestral land of the west sea, but this function hasn't been used yet.
People mostly only connect their hall to their own ancestral land.
'Anyways, one day, they'll do it. This way, my domain will expand and they can benefit from it too.
In the end, it frees up their domination of the local area around their domain, allowing other beasts to raise.
This will be a positive circle – the super strong enter the heart domain, and the weak have a chance of advancing. Once they're strong enough, they can move their domain too, formally joining the west sea clan.
I can already imagine a prosperous scene of the ancestral domain expanding more and more, becoming a top power in the world!"
As for there being too few clans after the major ones left? He didn't think so.
There are countless sea animals. Even in the modern age, they calculated over 250.000 species. If everyone of them became strong enough to join the west sea clan ancestral land, then Zhangyu would jump high into the sky and announce it to the world.
Not to mention that this was the primordial world, and there are probably millions of species.
Even if the clans end up being marginal Blue Fish Clan and Red Fish Clan, it doesn't matter. Once they reach the threshold and enter the ancestral land, they can be assigned to their own ancestral lineage.
While Zhangyu was deep in his dreams of the future, he had already left the west sea and flew to the west region.
Leaving the water was quick, after all, the ancestral land had several spatial nodes, all of which were in his control.
But, once you were outside, you had to move on your own.
His flight to the western region took a whopping thousand years, even with his Middle Great Unity Golden Immortal stage…