Shuxue was in the throne room of the Infinity Sector’s new palace, scribbling away on some paper.

“... which means the ratio between line segment AB and line segment BC is the same as the ratio between line segment BC and line segment AC! Profound, too profound!” Shuxue sat back on his throne, sighing with ecstasy. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the engraving of a golden spiral fixed upon the wall of his throne room.

The carving had been pillaged from the Greentree Sector, which Zhujiao had utterly annihilated the other day. Because they had refused to see the light of Zhujiao, all 7,000 of its disciples had been put to death, as well as the dogs, cats, and the little mice that just happened to pass by.

“This golden spiral…” Shuxue began breathing heavily, his eyes flitting between the line segments on his paper and the carving.

Shuxue was lost in thought, and an indeterminate amount of time passed before a voice finally brought him to his senses.

“Sector head! Sector head!” The voice of a young maiden drifted into his ears.

Shuxue snapped to attention. “It’s Patriarch, fool! Sector head is an outdated term.”

The young maiden, a girl brought over from the former Yellowcloud Sector, curtsied.

“Financial minister Jingji (meaning: Economics) asks what to do with the pearls from the 23 dungeon expeditions our Infinity Sector carried out last night. Also, the mathforce drilling rigs from the Blacktar Sector have been transported to the outside of our Holy Mountain Range, as Jingji requested. Also, -”

“Hey, hey, hey.” Shuxue grumbled, twirling his pencil between his fingers. “I’ve assigned all financial matters to minister Jingji, all expedition planning to minister Maoxian (meaning: Adventurer), all jade slip distribution and Sector competitions to minister Feiliao, all self-defense and escort missions to minister Shibing (meaning: Soldier), all Sector geographical and architectural planning to minister Fengshui (google Fengshui if you don’t know about it Right Now!), all new recruits processing to minister Ellis (see Ellis Island), and all diplomatic matters to our Grand Ancestor, Zhujiao! All I’m supposed to do is process the incoming jade slips and problem sets we obtained! Why are you telling me about this bullshit? Am I, the Patriarch of the Infinity Sector, really expected to take care of these meaningless day-to-day affairs?”

The girl cowered. “Minister Jingji just wanted esteemed Patriarch to have a say in some of these important matters, I’m just a messenger, please-”

It was too late for her. Shuxue’s hand descended down upon her face and gave it a loud slap. “Impudent girl! You think these supercilious matters are important? Who gives a damn about some money, it’s all going to that bottomless hole, Zhujiao, in the end anyway! In this multiverse, the only things that matter are the Mathematical Laws, not money! Not that you would understand... I bet you think about, about, what’s the word? Defecating? Copulating? with boys in your spare time, just like all the other vapid girls in this Sector!”

Trembling, the girl walked out of the room. Sighing to himself, Shuxue picked up his problem set again. As he was about to start on a problem, an old woman with sharp eyes, hard lips, and high cheekbones walked in.

“Patriarch.” She bowed her head to Shuxue, but only slightly. She had a cold and regal demeanor that commanded respect from her surroundings. If she did a full bow, it would seem out of place.

Shuxue looked up again. “Minister Fengshui. What are you here for?” Of all the ministers Shuxue had appointed, he disliked Fengshui the least. She had a much greater appreciation for the laws than the others. Fengshui had been the Matriarch of the Elegance Sector, but after Zhujiao had achieved his impossible victory 3 days ago, it had only taken a little bit of coercion on the part of Shuxue to make her submit, and, more importantly, allow him to confiscate her Trigonometry jade slips for processing.

Fengshui was currently tasked with designing the look of the new Sector. This was crucially important, apparently; the more the Sector harmonized with the mathematical Laws, the more mathforce would gather inside the Sector. The reason the higher planes were higher, was because their harmony with the mathematical Laws allowed more mathforce to manifest itself in the plane! Personally, Shuxue didn’t give a damn about mathforce, but he found Fengshui’s principles of mathforce optimization very interesting.

Fengshui raised her head up, her eyes looking around the throne room. On one side were neatly stacked pyramids of thousands of jade slips, and on the other was a haphazard pile of papers and jade slips. Some of them were even stained with worldly filth. Seeing this mess, her left eyelid began to uncontrollably twitch.

“Patriarch… the buildings of my Elegance Sector have been transported over. I invite you to take a look outside, and see the elegance and beauty of the mathematically arranged and designed Sector.” She looked up at the ceiling, refusing to look at the mess of jade slips and papers Shuxue had made.

Shuxue had not been paying attention to a single world she had said, until he had heard the word “mathematically.” Smiling with anticipation, he rose from his throne and descended down the steps, flinging open the large double doors made from blackiron steel. “Mathematically arranged and designed? I shall be looking forward to this!”

He strode out of the throne room, motioning towards two handmaidens holding oversized leaf fans. “I have finished processing a good amount of jade slips, gather them up, clean off my worldly filth, and store them at the Infinity Library.”

As Shuxue walked down the great hall at the front of the palace, he thought about the events of the past 3 days. The great battle had left the foundations of 40 Sectors completely crippled. Upon learning that Zhujiao’s plot armor artifact could even teleport as long as the teleportation could “drive plot forward” or some strange thing like that, Shuxue had made full use of it. In a single day, he was able to meet all 40 Sectors to try coercing them into joining the newly formed Infinity Sector. 17 of them had yielded, but the other 23 had to be razed to the ground by Zhujiao.

Whether they yielded or not, Shuxue didn’t really care. Either way, all their jade slips were Shuxue’s and all their pearls were Zhujiao’s. Other useless items, such as pills and mathematical artifacts, Shuxue left to minister Jingji, who hailed from the Bluedirt Sector which had surrendered to Shuxue early on, to take care of.

The members of the Sectors that had yielded had relocated to the Brownwater Sector’s mountains, the base of the new Infinity Sector. With them, they had brought pet mathematical beasts, new Mathivation techniques, and expertise, such as minister Shibing, a veteran of many Sector wars and a top advisor of the former Luckylotus Sector. Some Sectors had even donated buildings, rare plants and equipment to the Infinity Sector!

“Ah,” Shuxue breathed out a contented sigh as he exited the palace grounds to turn around and look it over. “It was so generous of the Whitecloud Sector to posthumously donate their Rectangular Prism palace to our Infinity Sector. I have meditated on the profound mysteries of the carpet patterns here many times already. And don’t get me started on the perfect symmetry of the golden chandelier in the seventy-third dining room.”

Fengshui nodded, smiling. “Indeed. The palace was designed by an expert in the art of Mathforce Gathering Optimization. The way the cubic rooms are patterned alongside the rectangular prisms work together with the flying buttresses to generate immense amounts of mathforce within this area! For this reason, the Whitecloud Sector was able to have their disciples Mathivate faster, allowing for double the gains in half the time.”

Shuxue snorted. “Who cares about Mathivation? It’s all about meditating upon the laws.”

Fengshui shrugged. “Mathivation is strength, and strength is the foundation and the core of a Sector. By the way, we must watch out for the Whitecloud Sector!”

Shuxue stared at Fengshui, as if she was an idiot. “The Grand Ancestor and I personally smited that Sector until not a single person was left alive. Then, I used my persuasive skills to convince their dead bodies to donate this palace to us! What are you talking about?”

Fengshui frowned at Shuxue. “Can it be that you don’t know that this Whitecloud Sector is a mere branch Sector of the true Whitecloud Sector?”

“A branch?” Shuxue was stunned.

Of the hundreds of Sectors in their region, the Whitecloud Sector had reigned supreme. But it was merely a branch Sector?

Fengshui looked at Shuxue solemnly. “The power of the Whitecloud Sector in the neighboring continent is thousands of times more than this mere branch you decimated. This is a colossal, top-tier Sector that we cannot yet touch!”

Shuxue blinked, then shrugged. “Yeah, whatever. We’ll smite them in due time.”

Fengshui shook her head. “No, but that’s not all. That Whitecloud Sector in the neighboring continent is a mere branch Sector of the true Whitecloud Sector, which is the top Sector in our entire plane!”

Shuxue blinked again, then shrugged again. “Yeah, whatever. We’ll smite them in due time.”

Fengshui shook her head again. “No, but that’s still not all. That Whitecloud Sector of our plane is a mere branch Sector of the true Whitecloud Sector, which is the one of the strongest Sectors of the entire Tesseract!”

“What!” This time, Shuxue was astounded. The entire Tesseract? What did that entail?

It was common knowledge that the Mathematical Laws, upon their formation 10^-43 seconds after the Big Bang, had used mathforce to create the Tesseract, a collection of infinite 3-dimensional planes ruled by the Mathematical Laws!

Inside the Tesseract, there were infinite 3-dimensional planes, and Shuxue lived unequivocally in the weakest plane of them all! Out of infinite planes, their plane was simply the weakest. It was an undeniable fact. The level of knowledge and insights into the Mathematical laws of the inhabitants of this plane was evident from the sheer lack of mathforce pervading the air! For the Brownwater Sector, which was the weakest Sector in the weakest country in the weakest continent in the weakest plane, to have destroyed a branch of one of the top-tier Sectors of all the infinite planes of the Tesseract…

“That’s pretty impressive!” Shuxue smirked, before starting to walk again. “No worries, I don’t care too much about worldly affairs, but our Infinity Sector will turn this plane into the number one plane in the Tesseract!”

Note: four paragraphs of chapter 9 were completely ripped off from Book 4, Chapter 9 of Desolate Era. Credit goes to IET and IEW for the branch sect paragraphs.