"Did you finish your Ascension?" Lin asked, seemingly annoyed at being disturbed from her work.

Then again, the chance of working with the forearm of a Tier 9 beast was quite rare, in this world or any other.

Beside the Maker, another Avatar pursed her lips, as if forcefully restraining herself to speak. Then again, her Words were weapons...as with all Power Word Guns.

Pef's Avatar just nodded and poked at the claws of the Taotie with a deep frown. Making use of this arm wouldn't be easy nor free of danger.

This wasn't purely a discarded limb, just like the branches of the World Tree were not mere kindling. A part of the Taotie was still imbued in this limb, and unlike the Wine he made with a drop of the beast's blood, he couldn't completely refine the claws or the paw bones or skin.

Still...there were ways to bypass this.

"I still need to stabilize my new realm, and become accustomed with what I can do. Firstly, we extract the claws, except for the small one. I aim to craft four super weapons from the claws." Pef decided as his Avatar placed his hand on the chopped off limb.

Lady Lin agreed at once. As a Maker, crafting things was her foremost inclination, but this would be the grandest project she ever worked on.

Faith, the weapon's Avatar turned towards Pef and measured him with a piercing stare. Despite what she could sense and infer if not, Pef shouldn't have been strong enough to battle the Taotie and even cut off an arm. Even after Ascending, he couldn't be.

"What did you gain on the other shore, Sergeant?" Faith asked in worry.

Pef just glanced swiftly at the armored Avatar, then shook his head. "Perspective, my dear Faith. Infinite in distance and unbound by death." he declared with a faint smile, then used his newly acquired Formation Dao to extract the four claws, using Gravity arrays as fulcrums and levers to move the nigh-infinite heavy claws.

Even so, he was starting to feel the limitations of his powers, partly due to the incomplete nature of the Eight Element method, and partly because dealing with anything Taotie was just that difficult.

Leaving Lin to strain her soul dealing with a single beast claw, Pef split once more into three Avatars and began arranging advanced formations to subdue and purify the remains of the beast from the claws.

'Heart Ruler, I think we can incorporate one of these claws into yourself. They should be quite durable and most importantly, higher in Tier.' he told his own weapon.

'Sure, I don't mind being stronger.' the Ruler answered with a careless tone.

'And the rest of the arm we can give to my orange glove. In order for it to become a true Divine Artifact, a stronger material is needed.' Pef continued in the same calculated voice. While the General had provided the skin for the base of the original glove, that was no longer a strong enough component.

'Wise.' was all the glove answered. Probably very busy centering itself after the last Ascension.

This was new territory for every one of them, and for most of the multiverse as well. Reaching Tier 8 was never a certain thing, even with a hundred lifetimes of experiences to draw from, or despite of them.

"Here! Sip some of the new Divine Wine." Pef urged his smith wife, who had already depleted her meager qi reserves, without much results.

Lady Lin took the wine carefully and sipped just a little, then closed her eyes as she began to glow.

Pef followed as well, sipping some Divine Wine and meditated on the rush of insights. Although not a true Godbeast, the Taotie was similar enough in results if not the same origin.

Countless Chaos Cycles of hunger inside the Mausoleum prison, and even more time before that in the Higher Heavens, had transformed a mean but powerful forest beast into a creature with no racial enemies. Everything was only food for the Devouring beast, not only material things like planets or people, but souls and energy as well.

'You were right, Soldier. The Mausoleum certainly has an impact on the strength of the Taotie, just like the Mantle Array forces the beast to act as the guardian for the Seven Color Pagoda. I think it limits his powers to the maximum of candidate's realm. You basically fought the strongest Taotie to ever exist in Tier 7.' the glove explained after analyzing the combat logs carefully. For entire minutes.

'So, if I were to enter again, there will be a super-strong Tier 8 Taotie in there. No thanks.' Pef grumbled as his bones ached. Ever after healing his wounds and regaining most of his mental faculties, the thought of fighting the Taotie again was daunting, not to mention one that would be a thousand times stronger.

'Indeed, we will need to be prepared before we try again. Just because you're stronger than Rejin or the Serghoul doesn't mean much, not beside the Taotie.' the orange glove replied in a calm tone. It also implied they would fight the beast again.

Pef scowled. The only good thing would be the Taotie would feel much the same. The beast got trashed as well, and wouldn't be too happy to repeat the experience.

That also explained much about the Jade Emperor. Everyone agreed the man had been the best Tier 7 to ever exist, not only highly learned and cultivated, but strongest of all the Tier 7. But since he also had to fight only a Tier 7 Taotie, his victory was at least plausible.

Luckily for Pef, he 'only' fought a five of nine spar, not a death duel. While Pef was pretty strong, the part of being highly learned and skilled with all formations and thousands of Daos was not. He had barely mastered a dozen of Daos, and was sorely lacking in many important fields, even now.

He was also only 23 years of age, if disregarding some time dilation experiments.

'Anyways, at least my senses have increased a hundred times. I can ever see the Breach.' Pef muttered in slight disappointment.

While his inner screen stats had increased appropriately to his new Tier 8 realm, only the sensory stats had gained a significant boost.

'Ignore the numbers for now. We will need to calibrate the soul array again, but I expect you're already in top 5 in this multiverse. Probably equal to the Fay Godmother.' the orange glove said in a casual tone. While stats numbers had their role, Pef had plenty of intangible bonuses that were not reflected yet by the inner screen.

-----

That screen array had been made by a weaker and lower Tier glove, and while Pef hadn't managed to completely reproduce the formation until now, that will change as he came into his Inheritance fully. Going from 3 percent to 67 percent in Formation Dao will have a profound impact on everything Pef could do in the future, including upgrading his artifacts or inner formations and many other things.

Formations were the ultimate cheat of the cultivator world, as they could create anything, from armies and weapons, to fortresses and palaces, gardens or seas and even universes and entire new races. And even if Pef failed to understand and exploit his Inheritance, the glove would not. Such a wonderful opportunity to influence the world would not come again.

No longer limited in scope and distance, the orange glove could now freely explore and read or hear anything and everything in the multiverse, with only a cautious berth around the Tier 9 entities. It wouldn't do to get noticed before it was prepared.

But once the arm of the Taotie was integrated into itself, the glove could finally focus on its mission. Killing the Dragon Emperor.