10 days after the great battle.

The entire plane had witnessed the descent of devils. Mortals and cultivators all talked about the details of the battle. While the stories were mostly accurate, many elements of exaggeration had already appeared in the accounts being circulated.

This was the first time Aterna had otherworldly contact and it was definitely not a good experience. The naive Aternians understood that they were not alone and there were others around. And they were not friendly. The battle had caused the death of a huge number of natives. While the number of devils killed was definitely more, it still gave the entire plane a great deal of shock. They felt that their earlier racial and tribal conflicts were probably childish in the eyes of bigger powers. Thus, it was a time of unprecedented peace.

During this time the scavenging of the corpses had already happened and several mountains of corpses were left. These contained both the corpses of plane dwellers and the devils. As all these were cultivator corpses, their value was immense. To have five million corpses would solve most of the problems of any race. But Michael had specifically ordered that the corpses were not to be touched.

At that time, several people came from the god-beast race and surrounded the entire battlefield. There were more than a thousand people standing around the battlefield and all of them were in a mysterious and complex formation. But when Michael saw the formation, he felt that it was similar to the formation that he used in the past - sacrifice.

This was the complete version of the sacrifice ritual that Michael had used for his resurrection. And the ones placing the formation were all ancestors of god-beasts. These were all ancient experts who had fought in the ancient calamity beckoning war!

Each of them was an immortal! This scene if revealed to ordinary mortals, would topple the established system of the world. Just the remaining force from the ancient era contained a thousand immortals. Of course, the new races could not compare. This was only a shadow of Aterna's majestic past. In the past, Aterna was a secondary plane. A secondary plane was countless times more prosperous than a tertiary one. It could be seen from the fact that even an ascendant who had crossed three transformations was unable to conquer it. But, a single demi-ascendant could unite a tertiary plane.

These experts were proof of once lost glory. But if one looked closely, they would find that all their souls were extremely feeble. These were the experts that had been in slumber for millions of years already living beyond their lifespan. They could indeed show significant power, but only for a short duration of time.

But they had all gathered here after the devil war was over. Why?

It was to perform this sacrifice ceremony. It was the grandest sacrificial ceremony help in Aterna since ancient times. Thus, these experts were going to become the nodes of sacrifice formation and they were going to sacrifice themselves to the plane.

As these experts took their place, they all ignited their souls and started the ritual. Golden light burst from all sides as the plane-will descended. The laws thrummed and the entire world vibrated. This was the manifestation of plane-will. After countless years, the will had manifested in its entirety.

Usually, only the laws descended with a portion of the plane-will. But now was clearly different. It was the plane-will itself!

The entire world was trembling. All mortals, beasts, plants and animals were frozen as they felt the feeling of reverence arise from the depth of their existence. This was the world that they lived in! The world that birthed them all.

As the plane-will came down, the immortals in the formation breathed their last and died in the formation. Michael used his soul powers to complete the rest of the ceremony. The plane-will was conflicted. While it was happy that the Devils failed and so many devil corpses were available for it to absorb and recover, it was also sad for the death of so many of its children. But it did not stop it from gobbling up the entire battlefield as it was a sacrifice.

The plane-will was capable of only rudimentary emotions and did not have much intelligence. Thus, it worked in somewhat fixed ways.

As the sacrifice came to an end, the will rewarded its children.

At the same time, all the soldiers from the allied army felt their cultivations rising! The laws of the plane itself were working for this miracle to happen. All of them gained cultivation worth a few years in one go.

The next to be rewarded were the generals and the ones who performed especially well. Almost all saints gained insights into laws. This was not an understanding of laws but it was the direction for exploration. This would make their future cultivation much easier.

The greatest insights were received by Ambrose, Remeus and Leonor. All of them felt that their insights had increased by leaps and bounds and their understanding of their respective laws increased to a whole new level. Both Ambrose and Remeus were at the level that they only needed to go into secluded cultivation to breakthrough to the perfect realm.

Leonor also managed to upgrade his law to the living mountain law. Now, he could step into the perfect realm anytime he wanted.

But among the saints, the greatest benefit was availed by Kandrif - the strategist and commander of the army. The plane-will ignited his bloodline! He was the bearer of ancient werebeast bloodline - something that was unique across all the werebeasts.

Almost everyone knew that the races elevated to awareness and intelligence. But what no one knew was that most of the races that were elevated managed to acquire human form. Because the human form had the greatest adaptability. In scientific terms, the humanoid body and soul structure was a special structure that was optimal for propagation. Thus, humans and humanoid races were found across all planes. But as races acquired humanoid forms, their original bloodlines would morph and shift. This led to a decrease in power. After all, humans were the most plane of all races. They did not have any racial abilities. But some individuals of different races might have dormant ancient bloodlines. These bloodlines contained the power of their original ancestors - from before the conception of their race. When these bloodlines awakened, they would grant great benefits.

The same happened with Kandrif. He was a peak saint who was focussing on the law of strength. His cultivation did not change at all but as his bloodline activated, his combat power went through the roof, directly reaching the immortal realm! His attunement to laws also increased rapidly. His potential deepened and his future in cultivation became much more secure.

While his contributions were significant, the reward was completely outrageous. But the plane-will did not reward based on fairness only but also considered optimality. Kandrif already had the ancient bloodline and with time, he would have awakened his bloodline. What the will did was simply giving him a push.

But, giving someone an ancient bloodline - that was something that even the plane-will would hardly ever do.

All the perfect realm experts got revelations of their own laws. The same was true for immortals as well. But not for Michael. He received a memory inheritance - the inheritance of an expert who had mastered internal energy. With the experiences of that ancestor, Michael's many problems were solved. He was confident that with just a month of seclusion, he would be able to form internal energy!

But all this was not worth mentioning against the god-beast race. In this battle, they had given up the majority of their resources. And even among the deaths, more than half were the members of god-beast races. Adding the sacrifice of the thousand immortals, the god-beasts had lost almost half of their foundation! They also renounced their individual rewards!

But the plane-will did not disappoint them. In return for their show of devotion and atonement, the will lifted their curse!

Now, there was no difference between the god-beasts and other races in terms of law comprehension. Adding the huge racial benefit, the god-beasts had a chance to rise to prominence again!

After the rewards were settled, the will vanished like an illusion.

But the impact of this ceremony had only started. As the logistics team worked day and night to record all the gains of the battle, the experts all went into secluded cultivation to digest their gains.

And in a month's time, the entire plane seemed to erupt with activity. Most of the soldiers made a breakthrough to the next small realm in cultivation. And many new saints appeared! Almost a thousand!

New perfect realm experts appeared - more than 50 of them. Most notable ones were definitely Ambrose, Remeus and Leonor.

Ambrose finally began his conception of illusion laws. His battle power improved to the level where normal perfect realm experts were not a match for him - even the peak stage ones! Ramsus was already extremely powerful - unmatched in the perfect realm. His powers also increased as his cultivation of blood laws deepened.

Remeus reached the perfect realm with the fiend law - another grand law! Thus, he too became extremely powerful after the breakthrough. The same was true for Leonor who reached the perfect realm with the living mountain law. All these were perfect realm cultivators with the power of grand laws! Thus, their combat power was simply unmatched in the same realm. They could fight the newly ascended immortals like Jerome and Reez for a period of time!

But no one made more progress than Michael. He was finally able to create internal energy. As soon as he aligned his body and soul together - a miraculous change occurred. His body and soul fit together and his physical strength merged with his soul strength forming a new type of energy. This energy had great power and impact. A whiff was enough to blast the surrounding to smithereens. But it was extremely light and easy to manipulate. It could be called at will and deployed as soon as one thought for it. But more than speed, it was able to go through solid objects at the will of its owner. This was an extremely destructive power - the internal energy!

Just with the addition of internal energy, Michael was confident of fighting the entire devil army by himself! After all, both his body and soul were extremely powerful giving a great amount of internal energy reserve. Adding his dao intent, he was confident of killing demi-ascendants!

But it was not the end of his benefits. After he gained internal energy, his body and soul seemed to merge together forming a single unit. This reinforced both his body and soul. It was not that he had obtained more power but that he had become more compact. This gave both his body and soul a boost in defence. But, most importantly, Micahel could feel the power of life and death laws flowing through his body and soul. His body which lacked the signature of death laws rapidly gained it. Similarly, his soul which lacked the signature of life law gained it as well. Now, Michael's law cultivation path was no longer blocked! As long as he wanted, he could reach the perfect realm.

All in all, while the others progressed by small steps Michael progressed by leaps and bounds.

After the battle's gains were calculated, the races held together a grand conference to distribute the wealth and also plan for the future. The number of space stones was enough for the races to send many scouts to the other plane and that was exactly what they did. After all, Michael would not step into an unknown dangerous land head first.

Meanwhile, Michael resumed his cultivation as now there was no longer a shortage of stones to cross the portal. In the few years that followed, his cultivation increased at great speed. After the battle, three years passed.

In that time, many changes happened in Aterna. Michael reached the early perfect realm with two grand laws. As soon as he made his breakthrough, he became able to use the power of laws in conjugation with his body and soul. This was another benefit of internal energy - it sped up soul cultivation for Michael. Soul path was much behind body path in Aterna. Thus, the resources that could cleanse the soul were not found in Aterna. As even devils did not have a resource of this kind, it was safe to assume that soul-cleansing resources were rare in the worlds beyond. But with the help of internal energy, Michael could expel his soul impurities with the medicinal power of the body cleansing pills which were easily available to him. This allowed him to step into the law-conception realm with both his body and soul.

His progress scared almost all the experts in Aterna. At one point, Michael had casually used his internal energy at an event. This alarmed all the experts and all of them started researching the power that Michael had used. After the immortals figured out that Michael had become an internal energy expert, they became even more fearful of his powers. Who knew how strong he was now? In fact, Michael himself did not know the answer to this question. Adding the power gained from cultivation and mastering internal energy, he could probably kill demi-ascendants of the calibre of Devil-Captains in a short battle. As his internal energy could directly impact their souls with incredible force. But there was no way to test the extent of his powers. In a way, Aterna was growing too small to hold him.

But Michael did not go to the other plane. The scouts had yet to return and he knew that when he left, he would have a huge mission on his hands - to find a solution to battle the devils. It was definitely not going to be easy. And according to the information that they had, the plane was likely to be extremely big and dangerous. Thus, Michael was actually very nervous about the trip. He spent his time trying to master the third chapter of endless life scripture.

Leaving Michael, the Ragebergs family's hold on the human race deepened. For one, both Sitara and Collins made a breakthrough and became immortals. This gave them all the support needed. Michael also gave the light of dawn to his father. While it was still helpful for him, there was no opponent who could threaten him on the plane. But when he left, it would make the race's position unstable. Thus, leaving the treasure with his parents was his choice. His parents, overall, had decent strength.

Michael also kept on adding formations obtained from the devils to the illusion formation around the Rageberg city. This made it so that even if he left one day, his parents would be able to hold the fort. After the war, his brother had returned. In terms of combat power, he was not much worse than an immortal. This gave Michael the confidence to leave his plane. His sister was currently in the saint realm but she had a lot of longevity left. There was no need to worry at the current time.

Meanwhile, the Atrexias had died while battling the devils. Michael had made sure to exploit their family and all of them had been drafted to the front lines in the battle. Michael did not make a move himself. The devils killed them but even in death, they had to bleed for the plane. In Michael's eyes, his two enemies killing each other was the scenario that gave him the greatest happiness!

This caused the entire political power to get concentrated in the Rageberg family hands. The reign of the family was extremely strong. As there were four immortals, countless powerful formations, many powerful treasures and even an immortal-slayer (Maria) apart from Michael, even in his absence, humans were now a race that could hold on their own. And most importantly, as long as people were not a hundred per cent sure that Michael was dead, no one would dare to attack his family. After all, Michael could seemingly resurrect!

The other races also improved. The elves and werebeasts were still at about the same level of power. Kandrif managed to get enough insights into the law of strength and reached the perfect realm. While the law he cultivated was not a grand law, his ancient bloodline gave him sufficient combat strength to offset that. In fact, he was stronger than Michael's knights and his brothers. He could actually overwhelm the weakest of immortals in battle. But the greatest impact was made by the god-beasts. 7 of the slumbering experts from previous generations like Maria reached the immortal realm in the past 3 years. As most of the slumbering ancestors were dead, this was the much needed fresh blood in these races. While it seemed like the God-beasts would rise, it was actually not the case. When they were under the curse earlier, the survival of these races was at stake. So, they had huddled together. But now, they had the future in front of them. How could they form alliances and give benefits to others? Their internal political strife deepened. The Roc race, the qilin race and the white tiger race were in one group while the dragons and phoenixes had their own alliance. In the end, it was like the rise of five powerful races instead of one. Individually, they were unlikely to surpass the werebeasts or the elves in strength.

The dark and neutral races were suppressed but not to the extent that they regressed. As a result, Aterna now had many powerful races and without Michael, humans would not be dominant. The plane was actually regaining a flare of its former glory when many powerful races roamed the earth. The plane-will recovered by a lot and many resources gradually started becoming available. The birth rates increased and the heaven and earth energy thickened. While these changes were not very drastic, they were still noticeable. One could say that the battle with devils had put Aterna on the path to recovery. But, the threat of devils' attack still loomed on their heads.

The current prosperity could very easily turn into ashes if no suitable solution was thought of.

As the races prospered worried for the sustainability of the situation, the first scout returned from the portal. This was after many years that Aternians had made contact with the beyond and now was the time to know the results.