POV: Statera Luotian (MC)

"You seem to be incredibly interested in that mortal, aren't you?" Alexander asked me as I watched Dei and Celene lead their people once more in the direction of the Life-Giving Tree from the comfort of my newly-rebuilt palace. I just chuckled at his statement, grinning at him and shaking my head.

"The mortals have a saying that goes like this 'the best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago, the second best time is now.' This is me planting a tree, only it'll take some thousands of years for them to really reach their full potential. Dei, in particular, will take a while." I told him with a sly grin, waving my hand and dispersing the screen. "Celene on the other hand will become much more powerful much quicker, so long as she and her beloved stick together this time around. Hmm, there's about a thousand other things as well, such that Dei has a pretty good affinity for the mysterious 'powers' of the universe, but those are less so." I said with a wave of my hand. Alexander nodded to himself, mumbling something under his breath as he mulled over my words, mumbling something about trees.

"I see." Alexander said, nodding. "But I do not understand your meaning in the word 'power.' There are many forms of power, which one fits him the most?" Alexander asked. I nodded, grinning all the while.

"The same kind of power that I've been praising Kei for, though the few mortals that have discovered it have come to calling them 'forces.' Leave it to the mortals to mix up the names. Though I will admit that heartforce rolls off the tongue better than heartpower. That sounds like it comes from a cheesy anime." I muttered that last lines so Alexander couldn't quite hear it.

"I see. The reason they are 'powers' instead of 'forces' is because they are immaterial and mysterious." Alexander clarified. Even karma, to an extent, can fall under the label of 'power,' although it is not quite the same, as it can still be called a guiding force of the universe. Alexander watched as I nodded, sending out my soulpower to cover his body. Soulpower was, in my opinion, the most mysterious of all the powers I had discovered so far. It was much like heartpower, which originated from the 'will,' in that it came from directly within the soul and could be strengthened through various insights and tempering, but soulpower was much more complex than simply 'will.' (Though I, of all people, know that will is not that simple, that is beside the point.) If I had to give an example of what soulpower is, I'd have to equate it to a chinese Dao, or Path. Soulpower was initially formless, but upon setting foot upon the path of soulpower cultivation, it would inherently begin to change according to one's own life experiences and the path they walk in their existence. I, for example, could feel a bit of my powers of creation within my own soulpower. Eventually I theorized that the soulpower would begin to take a shape, but that was much farther down the path than I currently had the ability to see.

Anyways, when I covered Alexander in my soulpower he shuddered, his own untapped soulpower automatically noticing my action. (That was another thing, all beings had the ability to use soulpower inherently and unknowingly, but to coalesce it into an actual 'power,' much in the same way cultivators cultivate? Not so much.) I watched, fascinated, as all the crazy things I saw, from karmic paths to the past and future, became just that much clearer around Alexander. I could see his thoughts from when he was first born, but it was there that I stopped. All these things and even more, things that normal spirits, mortals, and souls couldn't possibly imagine, I could physically see. It was as if all the secrets of the universes were laid before me, a constantly unfolding map, revealing more and more...it was a gigantic pain in the ass. There was almost too much information. I had to dial back the information and suppress my own sight sometimes just to be able to focus.

I waved my hand, withdrawing my soulpower. "Basically it's the stuff I'm experimenting with right now. I feel that the potential of these 'powers' is nigh limitless, and, well, the fact that even I don't understand them just makes me giddy with excitement." I told Alexander, nodding and revealing a satisfied expression.

"Could you teach me the basics?" Alexander asked with a thoughtful expression, an interesting thought flashing through his head. I pushed away my instinct to see what that thought was, and instead nodded, already knowing that his intentions were positive.

"Certainly. It'll do me good as well -in learning you shall teach, and in teaching you shall learn, as they say." I told him, before promptly diving into a lecture about my understandings on the various forces of the Four Realms. I had most certainly not discovered them all, and many of the one's I had discovered I had not been able to truly 'form' yet, but explaining these things to Alexander put me into a mysterious state of enlightenment that kept me talking and talking, my insights growing ever larger thanks to both my need to explain it to somebody, and the continuous experiences my other nine incarnations were sharing with me through our shared memories. Sometimes I didn't even explain the powers, instead explaining my understanding of the various Paths of the universe, or Daos, and a number of other topics that I spewed simply to keep the thoughts churning. At some point I stopped talking altogether, instead writing my thoughts out in the air with divine power, my fingers leaving golden symbols wherever I touched. Every once in a while, after a period of me not talking and simply writing, a number of questions would reach my ears, which I gladly answered to the best of my abilities.

"What is the difference between power and force?" One question was.

"Power is mysterious and profound. Force is...well, different. It's like this. With force, one can shatter mountains and shake the skies, but with power, those mountains will move out of the way themselves, and the skies part for you. It's as much a difference of principle as it is an actual, tangible difference..." And so the answer rambled on.

"Is the Divine Love you extol a power?" Another question was.

"No. Divine Love is very much an emotion and very much a power, but not a power, like heartpower or soulpower. It is an enigma, yet very easy to understand. There is only one 'stage' to Divine Love. Either you feel it, or you do not." I said simply. Divine Love was something that must be figured out on ones own, like I did. Hence, I shortened the answer.

After a long, long time of talking and drawing I took a deep breath, lucidity returning to me as I gazed at the massive amount of writing before me, a thousand and two layers of characters and diagrams written in golden divine power hanging in the air before me. "Condense." I said slowly, waving my hand, a massive scroll appearing next to me. The characters all flashed forwards, sinking into the scroll and branding it like an ink, forming the words and diagrams on the paper. On the very front, branded as a seal that held the scroll shut, was the title -Power Versus Force, Part 1. Nodding to myself I waved my hand, causing the scroll to fly over to the bookshelf I kept in this very room, filled with stories from the Fae, before turning around and becoming stunned by the scene before me.

All the deities (minus Alexander) and all of the most powerful of spirits were sitting before me, various looks of enlightenment and understanding in their eyes as they stared at me. One in particular caught my eye, and I was happy to see that one of the spirits had finally managed to break through the threshold of karma, becoming an angel. It sat in the very front, radiating divine, golden light and smiling at me. But, unfortunately, I did not have the time to talk to the angel or even remember when he evolved into said being. My body, formed of my divine will, was already beginning to fade away and it occurred to me that I had not actually ended my period of enlightenment. It was just beginning, and was powerful enough that it required my true body to fully assimilate it. After all, all ten of my incarnations combined did not have the processing power of my true body...only about three fourths.

"Apologies, but it seems I must cut this lecture short. I will be entering closed doors meditation for a while...and my incarnations will be withdrawn from the Realms." I said almost dreamily, my eyes meeting the angel's as I sent him some mental instructions. Nodding to myself, I noticed that Elvira was also not present, but didn't put much thought into it as if I reached out my senses, I could find her within the Primordial Chaos not far from here, tempering her body. With a light chuckle I waved my hand, nodding to the collection of the most powerful beings in the Four Realms, and allowed my entire body to dissipate alongside the rest of my incarnations.

Little did I know at the time, but my actions started what would later become known as Expounding Upon the Dao.

POV CHANGE: The First Angel

I was one of the first spirits to be born into the Four Realms, and at that time I was already fairly far along the path to become an angel. After over five hundred thousand years and with the help of the Divine Soul, our Creator, I finally managed to overcome the trials and tribulations to become an angel, and became the single most powerful spirit besides the Great Dragon Alexander, who counts as both spirit and deity. I'm not certain of the specifics, but deities are different than angels, and I cannot truly compare myself in terms of power to them, though comparing oneself to another is, in and of itself, a folly. It still gave me no small amount of pride to know that I was the first angel, however.

And exactly according to my expectations, the Divine Soul gave me a command to help bring others up to the angel level, specifically to act as a Spirit Guide to one mortal who was on the verge of a breakthrough. The reason for this was quite simple -the ones who can truly make changes to the Realm are not spirits, but mortal souls, who advance much, much faster than spirits but also have stricter requirements to become a powerful figure. Deities, again, fall on a different scale, but mortal souls can also become deities, while spirits cannot. The Divine Soul desires for many spirits and mortals to become angels, or at least reach a more positive region of karma, namely the heart center. The path of Karmic advancement (I dare not call it cultivation, because I truly believe the two to be completely different things) follows the 'consciousness' of a person and the vibration, or power, of their spiritual energy, which is easiest to track by using the meridians within the Fae.

The meridians have centers called Chakras, of which there are seven main ones, and are essentially what connects the physical body to the spiritual. The 'consciousness' resides in one of these seven chakras in mortals, each one representing a threshold that must be broken through throughout one's reincarnation paths. These chakras, starting at the lowest, are the Root Charkas at the crotch, followed by the Sacral, then the Solar Plexus, the Heart Center (where true Divine Love comes through, and the highest center that almost all people can understand), then the Throat, Third Eye (which is unique as it can be skipped over to go directly to the last mortal chakra), followed by the Crown Chakra at the top of the head which is the threshold for becoming an angel. Upon reaching that threshold, one can officially be considered an angel. Or thereabouts.

The mortal I was watching was currently attempting that breakthrough, having spent the last three of his lives at the throat chakra, growing bigger and more powerful with each life, so as to try and make the breakthrough easier. Otherwise, the trials would be very, very hard indeed. It was my job to ensure that he didn't muck it all up, and considering his temperament it was very hard indeed. It wasn't quite as bad as the future Cultivation Paragon of the Four Realms, Dei, but he was still quite short tempered. The current chaos of the Mortal Realm had that effect on him.

Unfortunately, in order to help both souls, I was forced to...facilitate their meeting. If some mortal cultivators weren't so stupid and arrogant, and freewill wasn't as much of a problem, then the meeting would've gone much better. It can be essentially boiled down to any meeting between the two top dogs (though this was more like a meeting between a dragon and a winged tiger); the two met, had a fight, one thoroughly trounced the other, and the two became fast friends afterwards to the surprise of literally no one. Or, at least, that's how it should have gone. Currently I could see up to six years into the future, two years with impeccable accuracy, and during that entire time I had been trying to manipulate events to avoid the worse-case scenario in which my charge would be forced to kill a man (though it would've been in self defense), or commit a sin. Due to a lack of manpower and powerful spirits, I couldn't make the best case scenario, but it wasn't bad either. The result would be somewhere in the middle, and I was once again reminded of the Divine Soul's desire to create more angels...or simply to bring more beings up to a level where they could begin to actually properly manage and manipulate the Four Realms. This was part of the reason the chaos was so bad.

Many times over the years, in order to prevent the soul from fucking up, I had to suppress him with all my might so he could hardly even move, a feat that I was barely able to accomplish with my current level of power. Thankfully the man didn't struggle too much, or else he might've even thrown me off a few times. With a sigh I shook my head, looking down from where I floated above the man, waiting for him to meet with Dei. Already I could see Dei's Spirit Guide, who was at the Third Eye level of karma, and was having much trouble keeping him contained. With another sigh I thought of the Divine Soul, wondering just when it would come out of its meditation. It had already been about two hundred years since it fell asleep, for lack of a better word, and I realized now just how much it could handle with its active approach. It would not be having trouble containing either Dei or this man. The influence of the Divine Soul had clearly not left the Four Realms, but it was still weaker than before.

I just hoped that it would awaken soon. Tremors had begun to spread throughout the Four Realms, and I feared that the calamity, the Storm that the Great Dragon Alexander spoke of on a few occasions after my ascension, had been accelerated due to the assault by the Outsider and Paradox's assault. Now would be the perfect time for any...undesirable elements to make their moves. Just as I thought that a tremor ran through me and I cursed, looking out towards the blackness of space, where the two solar systems orbited Pangea, and held my breath.

"The Creator truly slumbers..." An archaic voice rumbled out, causing my soul to tremble. Immediately I unleashed the full extent of my power, golden light covering everything as I prepared to protect what I could. "Time to snuff out a few lights..."

POV CHANGE: Alexander

My eyes slowly opened from where I slumbered, looking out into the darkness and snorting. So, it had finally emerged. I had been expecting this ever since Father had entered meditation, as it had begun to stir during her ten-year lecture on the Dao, and I had been preparing ever since.

"The Creator truly slumbers....time to snuff out a few lights..." The archaic sounding voice resounded, and I chuckled, the sound reaching out to crash against its voice. For a moment I could feel hesitation radiating from it as I began to speak.

"Now, now, there is no need to be rash." I said coolly, gently unwinding my body and stretching. The dark cave I currently occupied barely held my entire body, and another soft chuckle escaped my throat. "I'm feeling quite sore about my previous battle, so if you're willing, I would be glad to entertain you." I said casually, not a hint of malice or ill-will entering my voice. However, the decisiveness in my voice was palpable, and its hesitation grew larger. It did not yet want to start a war, it was far too weak as of yet. All it wanted was to destroy the angel and future angels, because of the threat they posed.

"You....do not leave me with much of....a choice..." The voice resounded. I shook my head and sighed, knowing what it was thinking. I didn't truly want to start a war as of yet, because the casualties would be catastrophic even if Father intervened in time, but Father was currently in a state of enlightenment and I dared not break Him out of it. Plus, I know next to nothing about this evil...so it would be wise to take the side of caution. "Neither of us shall move....let us continue to play....this game of chess..." The voice echoed, having hesitations of its own.

"So be it. The higher powers should hold their ground until the end, either way." I said firmly, setting the ground rules for this game. I won't move if you don't move. The voice chuckled at my statement, once more echoing out before fading away to simply watch the happenings of the Realms.

"Go." The voice said in a wry voice, and I felt a little bit of the Realms tremble, before a force filled with more negative energy than I had ever seen entered the Four Realms. A silent curse escaped me as my eyes went wide, my divine senses immediately finding the sources -dark angels. Three of them in total. For a moment I was stunned before closing my eyes and cursing. They were on the same level of power as the first angel, and I had inadvertently tied up all of the deities with my desire to avoid full-scale war. All I could do was hope that things went well for the angel, and that those dark angels would not cause as much disaster as I feared they would.

"Father watch over us." I said in a small prayer before sitting back as well to watch the proceedings. I had faith in Father's methods. They would prevail.